• What did you think about Chancellor Rogers’s Self-Evaluation?

It was superficial, self-serving and Pollyanna-ish. It missed most of the major issues and misrepresented much.

• What would you say about the Chancellor’s relationship with the 8 institutions that comprise the system?

Chancellor Rogers’ relationship with the eight institutions that comprise the System is mixed to poor, because contrary to his claims, his relationships have involved micro-managing them. In his 2006 Self Evaluation, he states: “The Chancellor’s relationship with the System starts and ends with my relationship with the eight presidents. I believe it is injurious to all for the Chancellor to have any authority to instruct any System employee on any subject below the President. I expect the Presidents to report to me and I have told each that I will exercise no authority over anyone who reports to them.” However, in 2006, he opposed changes in the terms of the contract for UNLV Athletic Director (AD) Mike Hambrick that were similar to those that had been made the previous meeting to the contract of UNR’s AD, apparently in an effort to drive out Hambrick and replace him. While that effort surfaced because the change had to come before the board for action, there are also similar anecdotes told about his efforts to drive out other institutional staff below the presidential level. Yesterday, he engaged in an unprofessional public hectoring and bullying of Hambrick that was hypocritical if not plain dishonest and clearly malicious. (Among other things, he falsely accused Hambrick of not reaching out to the community when he – Rogers – didn’t even attend a single NSHE graduation ceremony this year.) In short, the contrast between his proclaimed hands-off principle and the reality of his behavior undermines completely his claims, made since his public interview with the Board to be appointed Interim Chancellor, to supreme integrity and being a stickler for honesty and forthrightness.

His relationships with the two flagship institutions, UNLV and UNR, have been notably marked by him driving out the two Presidents in office when he became Chancellor. If one accepts that it was a good idea to relieve them (and I don’t purport to know), it can be argued that he did so fairly effectively and with minimum ancillary damage via pressure that eventually caused them to leave their posts. However, shortly after becoming Interim Chancellor in 2004 and as part of the effort to drive out the UNLV president, he cancelled a $25-million commitment he had previously made to UNLV, leaving UNLV in the lurch. He seemed to do much better in the departure of CCSN President Richard Carpenter, so maybe he’s making progress.

• What do you think about the Chancellor’s efforts and progress on new initiatives, such as the Nevada Health Sciences System?

Regardless of whether the NHSS is ideal in the sense of being exactly what anyone would have designed from scratch, it is the health sciences and services-delivery path we are now following. However, even if it was in concept the best idea, it has been somewhat compromised and damaged by the personal stake that Chancellor Rogers has in it and his actions regarding it. There is a serious question as to whether the NSHE should be pursuing such a mission expansion when it is already challenged to do much better at its current mission scope. We may be spreading ourselves too thin in trying to solve all the problems of the world.

Jim Rogers has a history of self-aggrandizement by funding initiatives and slapping his name on them. To the extent that he or anyone else provides substantial funding for public benefit, they deserve such recognition for doing so and I support naming institutions for them or with their choice of another name. However, Mr. Rogers is said to have a history of promising and advertising higher levels of contribution than he actually makes, and more particularly of spreading his contributions over time so that he can leverage on a continuing basis more terms, conditions and concessions than those to which the recipients originally committed. Chancellor Rogers has advertised that he will put his own money into the NHSS, but has not yet done so and not yet sought to have the NHSS named for him or with the name of his choice. Even if he does not seek naming rights, his history and reputation noted above should raise a cautionary flag when he seeks active involvement (which many donors eschew) in conceptualizing and bringing to fruition such an initiative. That need becomes urgent and extreme when he also has CEO power as NSHE Chancellor. The potential problems and extent and urgency of the need for caution are already emphasized by two of his actions regarding the NHSS: a) the recent fiasco involving the search for a head for the NHSS; and b) his actions regarding the NHSS in the current Legislative session.

Active donor involvement in such initiatives is reasonable, although it often raises problems and complications. However, when the donor has CEO power in the recipient institution, then the relationship has become too complex and fraught with very real and tempting conflict-of-interest opportunities for him or the Board to be able to provide reasonable assurance that decisions are being made in the public interest. With Mr. Rogers being Chancellor, chief initiative proponent/architect, and advertised as prospective major donor, conflicts with the public interest are virtually assured, and there will be no way to convince the public that the project was not developed by him for his self-aggrandizement and to his particular tastes using public money in much vaster amounts than he can or would contribute. There will be an entirely reasonable suspicion that his private-agenda tail will be wagging the public-interest dog.

A committee of Board members, health science professionals and other qualified and dedicated persons had been formed (the Board’s Health Sciences Committee) and had engaged an executive search firm to help it find a head for the new institution. Early this year, the search firm produced a list of potential candidates for review. At that point, unilaterally, improperly and contrary to the desires of the Chairman of that committee (who is the voice of policy and direction to whom the Chancellor should report and answer in this matter), Chancellor Rogers intervened in the process directly and intemperately with the search firm because he was dissatisfied with the candidate pool. The net result was a blow up in which the NSHE was essentially fired as a client by a reputable experienced search firm due to Chancellor Rogers’ improper and very aggressive actions. Now, in addition to the schedule having been greatly set back by his rash and imprudently un-self-restrained actions, the word in both the search community and the community of potential candidates for the position is that the NSHE, this project and Chancellor Rogers are all poison to be avoided at any cost. The fact that the prudent and restrained actions of the Committee and its Chairman and the Chairman of the Board have been able to keep this matter quiet does not change the fact that Chancellor Rogers’ lack of the requisite mature judgment in his actions have set back the NHSS initiative badly.

Chancellor Rogers’ other problems with excessive involvement in too many ways in the NHSS are also illustrated in his advocacy for that initiative, as discussed in the answer to the next question that involves his relationships with the Executive and Legislative branches of state government.

• How effective has the Chancellor been with the Executive and Legislative Branches of the State Government?

Regrettably, Chancellor Rogers’ relationships with the Executive and Legislative branches of state government have not been very effective due to a combination of his ineptitude in some areas and his infidelity to the best interests of the NSHE and the policies of the Board that has at times veered into outright betrayal of those duties. Over the last year, Chancellor Rogers’ relationships with those two branches has been marked by his pursuit of four of his private agenda items, only one of which is arguably consistent with the best interests of the NSHE and Board policy. And in attempting to further his private interest in that one item, he may well have sold out or at least undermined the rest of NSHE interests. His four private agenda items have been:

1) His shrill, ill-informed and gratuitous advocacy of higher overall state tax levels – levels that are shown by the total body of serious scholarship in public finance to be, on net, destructive of aggregate human well-being as compared to current levels because they diminish economic growth; and especially of income taxes that voters have roundly rejected with a Constitutional amendment and which are also well-known to be very destructive of human well-being, economic growth and the public interest;

2) His shrill, ill-informed and gratuitous advocacy of extending all-day Kindergarten from at-risk populations that it already serves and for which public funding of such a program is arguably in the public interest to the rest of the population (i.e., to not-at-risk-student families), most of whom do not want or need it and for whom public funding of it is contrary to the public interest on the educational merits (because research shows it does not improve their long-term achievement and may well diminish it) and as a waste of scarce taxpayer dollars that could be better spent on other public priorities including higher education or that could be used to relieve pressure to raise taxes to ever more socially destructive levels;

3) His self-serving advocacy, contrary to express Board policy, of switching from election of Regents by the people to appointment of and by political insiders; and

4) His advocacy of the Nevada Health Sciences System.

While his advocacy for taxes and extending all-day Kindergarten may in part be undertaken in good faith, his presentation and defense of his positions on these matters are embarrassingly shallow and ill-informed (intellectually embarrassing, in fact), as well as gratuitous (advocacy unrelated to and unnecessary to the state of Nevada doing a good job in higher education). From these facts and his other actions, it is clear that this advocacy was undertaken in great part to curry favor with some politically extreme statists in the Legislature and press and the special interests they and he represent. Essentially, Chancellor Rogers has promoted the top two agenda items of Nevada’s minority of left-wing, extreme statists and has been their blunt tool in harassing the Governor Gibbons in return for their support of his other two private agenda items and perhaps for a vague promise that they would not be too beastly to the overall best interests of higher education.

On the other side, although Governor Gibbons has been gracious about the whole matter, Chancellor Rogers’ ham-handed political free-lancing has certainly been embarrassing to the NSHE and Board, and it has damaged the interests of higher education. Mr. Rogers’ relationship as Chancellor with Governor Gibbons got off to a terrible start when, as the gubernatorial campaign began in the summer of 2005, Rogers referred to Gibbons as “narrow-minded” and “simplistic”, and added, “I don’t think he’s very bright.” (This from a fellow who subsequently offered the intellectually embarrassing simplistic and socially destructive advocacy of higher overall tax burdens, income taxes and extending all-day Kindergarten to non-at-risk populations.) It is widely known that Chancellor talks regularly with extreme left-wing and smash-mouth columnist/broadcaster/blogger Jon Ralston, and that he and Ralston work together to float political trial balloons and promote aggressive statist agendas. So, when Ralston raised a rumor that Jim Rogers might fund the fantasy agenda of the extreme left-wingers – a recall effort against the Governor – few folks took at face value his subsequent disavowal of any such intention. The game he is playing has completely compromised the interests of higher education, and undermined and even betrayed Board policy and the duties of fidelity and integrity he owes as NSHE’s CEO. His performance in this area is not only ineffective, but damaging to the public interest.

A saving grace is that Chancellor Rogers, having little appetite or patience for details of the budget process, has left that work to the Vice-Chancellors and other NSHE and institutional staff and to the lobbyists jointly employed by him and NSHE (which joint employment is an absolutely unsound practice that needs to be remedied).

• How about his Relationship with the media and his public visibility?

His relationship with the media is mixed. He may well return all calls every day and the media may well be more supportive of NSHE than when Jim Rogers became Chancellor. Certainly, a lot of progress has been made by the Board and the System in those three years, starting from a very low water mark. Some credit in this area is due to Chancellor Rogers, some to Board members and some to various other people new and continuing in the NSHE, all making concerted efforts toward improvement in this area.

However, on the other side of the ledger, his claims made when he was appointed, repeated many times since then and echoed again in his self-evaluation, that he is totally honest and known for his integrity, and that he will not tolerate anyone who does not meet the same standard, are false. Before I was elected to the Board, I had heard accounts from reliable people in the Northern Nevada media that he is known primarily as a self-absorbed, self-indulgent bully and tyrant, given to rashly going off at little or no provocation.

Specifically undermining his claims of integrity and full honesty, he has recently surreptitiously put pressure on the editors who supervise the reporter who has given the most extensive and detailed coverage continuously to NSHE institutions and matters. My point in raising this item is not to claim that that reporter’s (or any reporter’s) work is completely above reproach or free of error. Suffice it to say that the reporter in question appears to this Regent to have done a workman-like job and always written and acted in good faith, even on particulars on which I did not agree. (In fact, some weeks ago I told the reporter that a characterization used of some important words I said and on which I had provided complete hard copy did not accurately or usefully convey the flavor, substance and intent of them.) I raise this point only to illustrate what I believe to be the Chancellor’s real reputation with the media – Jon Ralston excepted – of being a dangerous, vindictive bully that one crosses at one’s peril.

As I stated at the outset, the picture for his and the NSHE’s media relations is mixed, but better than three and four years ago.

Finally, I note that the Chancellor did not attend a single commencement exercise in the System this month, to my knowledge. And he did not arrange for Vice-Chancellors to fill in at all events. More than one Regent attended each event, with a majority for some major events. Chancellor Rogers’ public visibility may be good in that, by owning a string of media outlets, he has the power to inject favorable PR personally and otherwise to the System and institutions at any time it suits him. However, his parsimony with his time at such events and at Board meetings communicates an unfortunate and accurate message to the world that his agenda is more focused on self-aggrandizement and power and money politics than on higher education.

• How would you characterize Chancellor Rogers’s relationship with the Board of Regents?

His relationship with the Board is very poor and highly divisive. He owes the Board, the public and Regent Leavitt a complete and unadorned apology for his attacks on Regent Leavitt and his threat to resign if Regent Leavitt is elected Chairman or Vice-Chairman. The threat was insubordinate, absolutely unprofessional and unacceptable, and very damaging not only to relations with the Board but also to higher education. It cannot in any way be excused, and it would have led to the prompt firing of any other person in his position or a similar one – and we should apply the same standards to him as to anyone else in such regards. No excuse can justify over-looking this action, especially because it is only one item in a course and pattern of such behavior. For example, an excuse that Board members knew they were buying into such behavior when members hired him is insulting to them because it suggests they would knowingly harm higher education and the public interest by countenancing such behavior.

His arrogance; his disdain for the Board’s role in setting policy, direction and strategy and overseeing its implementation; and possibly a failure on his part to understand the basics of the Board/Chancellor relationship and of institutional governance emerged early in “Memogate” (a series of buffoonish and inappropriate memos he sent regularly to Regents early in his tenure attacking them). A major part of the problem is that his excessive ego, appetite for self-congratulation and long history of unchecked personal power and privilege due to wealth and a media empire seem to have warped his perceptions, judgments and behaviors.

• What in your view should be the performance objectives for the Chancellor next year?

He has a lot of remedial work to do. He’ll be digging out of a deep hole, and he needs to recognize that and completely change his attitudes and behaviors. To set performance objectives, we should start with frank acknowledgment of the main reason he was hired: his ability to contribute and, hopefully, to raise money from wealthy donors. He, himself, acknowledges that he has no great qualifications for academic leadership. There may be some notion that he was hired for management background in the private sector, but that’s undercut by the proliferation on his watch of System administrative and lawyer positions. On raising money, his pep talks at Board meetings give him continuing opportunities for self-congratulation, but they do not raise funds. Hectoring, badgering and goading potential contributors by throwing an “if you won’t give me your money, I’ll tax you and everybody else to show my vision and virtue” fit have not yet proven effective. He needs to try another approach with such donors.

He needs to work on the mature prudence, judgment and restraint his job requires and to reach out to the Board and public. He must understand and embrace the requirements of the job he sought and accepted and stop getting backward the principal/ agent relationship he has with the Board. He needs to reacquaint himself with living and working under the real-world standards that normal folks do and stop being a bully.

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