College of DuPage can't move forward without cooperative trustees

Once again, the news covers board disagreements, not College of DuPage's positives. What is at stake at COD?

Our students rely upon COD transfer credits. On Dec. 16, the Higher Learning Commission placed COD on probation, risking our accreditation. Not because COD lacks academic quality, but for its "lack of integrity in the College's operations" and "lack of adherence to established policies and procedures." Those findings dramatically confirm the prior leadership and ethical failures headed by the Breuder-era Board.

Faults the HLC identified mirrored why last year I ran for COD's board on a platform of "real oversight and reform." Breuder-era Board members insisted there was nothing wrong, nothing improper, that dissenting voices were manufacturing crises. They ignored the public's outrage at their antics and Breuder's buyout package. They were wrong. Problems started at the top.

Illinois taxpayers understand bad government. Poor leadership. Ethics indictments. But infections so pervasive our state's best community college was sick?

Betrayal.

April 2015's election of Trustees Bernstein, Napolitano and me transformed the Breuder-era board to a reform board. We accomplished a tremendous amount in seven months. Dr. Breuder is gone. HLC problems were already identified and cleaned up, with new accountability measures under way.

Trustees Wozniak and McGuire have secured considerable taxpayer-funded travel and dining perks during their tenure. Trustee Birt attended perhaps half our meetings. None advanced productive programs or policy changes to better serve the college.

We then lost our reform chairman, leaving votes tied between Breuder-era and reform trustees. When the HLC's findings were issued, we identified key reforms COD could pursue to overwhelmingly positive public approval. The Breuder-era trustees took a different approach - another trip reimbursement demand, taking the college's privileged documents, sending surrogates to shout false narratives.

Trustee McGuire proclaimed her desire to end patronage, restore fiscal probity and cooperate, despite her record of fighting every accountability measure we reformers put in place.

They call our request to comply with law enforcement requests political grandstanding.

They falsely attack our new general counsel, Tim Elliott, because he successfully defended the public's right to be in the boardroom for Dr. Breuder's severance package vote. They call that a conflict of interest. We say the college needs a man willing to stand on principle, insist we do what is right and defend the public trust.

They want our new college president search to grind to a halt. We want ethical leadership with a positive vision. Our 18-member bipartisan presidential search committee's dedicated college and community leaders have devoted countless hours to get this right. We have highly qualified resumes from a tremendous number of candidates who would love to come to COD. Academia knows COD's tremendous potential.

They call hardworking volunteers suspect, a search firm selection corrupt, despite the committee's public process. They deem "tainted" all but their own desires.

We need our seventh trustee.

After Trustee McGuire finally agreed to come to the table with her top candidates, she reneged without attending a single meeting, telling the state's governing board we were at impasse.

We welcome debate. They unforgivably choose to improperly boycott five consecutive meetings to bring the college to a halt. We gave them everything they supposedly wanted save outright surrender of our free speech rights. They called that a dirty political trick, refusing to appear.

They may have an agenda - but not for our college.

They support Breuder's $763,000 severance package and other administrator payoffs. Dangerously, they support impeding the U.S. Attorney investigating COD by refusing to comply with subpoena requests. They proclaim the cost of cleaning up their own mess is so high, that we should just stop doing it.

The public demanded reform, not scorched-earth destruction. We reformers will not surrender our duty or principles. All trustees are invited to walk together on a reform path to restore our great college. When our board again reaches seven votes, we can get back to work restoring the public trust.

COD enables greatness for every student who passes through our doors. COD's reputation deserves to be what it is: delivering quality education at affordable cost. What a shame the Breuder Three bring this bitter legacy.

• Deanne Mazzocchi is vice chairwoman of the College of DuPage Board of Trustees.