WOODLAND HILLS : Pierce Faculty Rebukes 2 Top Administrators

Faculty leaders at troubled Pierce College, venting their longstanding frustrations on administrators, passed unanimous no-confidence motions Monday against former Pierce President Lowell Erickson and Neil Yoneji, the interim chancellor of the Los Angeles Community College District.

The college’s Academic Senate had been considering the sanction against Erickson since last October. But Monday’s vote came a month after he ended three years as president to take a job in the district’s headquarters. Faculty members said they never want Erickson to serve as president again at any of the district’s nine campuses.

Faculty complained that Erickson allowed the college to drift into decline and rarely participated in meetings with them. Erickson, in the past, said he did the best he could given the district’s budget problems, which he blamed for poor conditions on the campus.

The sanction against Yoneji, who coordinated the leadership change at Pierce from Erickson to current interim president Mary Lee, embodied the complaint that he did not consult with faculty members about the change. Yoneji has maintained he had to act quickly to install a new president in time to influence Pierce’s budget for the coming school year.

The sanction motions by Pierce’s faculty leaders are strictly statements of their opinion and have no binding effect, although such motions can be considered by the district’s Board of Trustees in future personnel decisions. Such motions used to be rare, although they have become more common in recent years at colleges facing tough economic times.

At the same meeting Monday, faculty leaders withdrew proposed no-confidence motions against the two other top administrators under Erickson who have remained at the college with Lee: Don Love, vice president for administration, and Bill Norlund, vice president for academic affairs.