Pierce President Has to Love a Challenge

The person who replaces Pierce College’s lame-duck president, E. Bing Inocencio, does so at his or her peril.

When the presidential search committee comes together at the end of the month to sift through applicants, it will be the fourth time in 10 years such a panel has convened at Pierce. The new president will take over a campus beset with financial difficulties and a contentious debate over the future of the college’s farmland.

Once the Los Angeles Community College District’s flagship, Pierce is now the most impoverished campus in the system, with a $650,000 deficit, a shrinking budget and a deteriorating infrastructure. Pierce’s enrollment of 12,200 students is up a mere 0.4% this semester over spring 1998. That comes after the college reported a 10% enrollment slide in the fall, down from about 14,300 in the fall of 1997.

A decade ago, enrollment was about 25,000.

Even if the new president is able to guide the college into calmer currents, he or she may soon have to steer the institution into relatively unknown waters with two major partnerships with private industry.

A proposal for a golf course and equine center on a large portion of the Pierce College Farm is likely to be approved by college administrators at the end of the month and could go before the district board of trustees in March. If the board approves the plan, a developer could be chosen by the end of the semester. Also under consideration is a biotech park fashioned after a similar endeavor at Cal State Northridge. If all goes well, that project could possibly go out to bid by the end of the year.

The most daunting challenge facing Inocencio’s successor, however, will be to appease the district board of trustees, which is under pressure from state auditors to balance the budget, while retaining the support of the faculty and community groups.

The teaching staff has been shaken by years of unstable leadership, while neighbors are fighting to preserve the farm, one of the last open spaces in the San Fernando Valley.

“Whoever gets the job has to have a real tough skin and has to be able to function in a system that is more political than educational,” said Helen Krahn, president of the Academic Senate.

Although the 18-member search committee is still being formed, the constituencies that will be represented have already been determined. Pierce students and community groups will have two representatives each. Four committee members, including the chair, will be selected by the board of trustees. The remainder will be selected by various unions, including the campus police union and the Teamsters, who represent Pierce’s academic deans.

The structure of the search committee will be identical to the one that chose Inocencio, said Lucian Carter, the district’s senior director of personnel operations.

But, Carter added, “All of the individuals will be new faces.”

The district has already advertised the job opening in the Chronicle of Higher Education and other national journals, and fliers will be mailed out in the next few days to potential candidates around the country.

Although the official deadline for applicants is Jan. 29, new candidates will probably be considered throughout the selection process, Carter said.

The committee will consider all candidates who meet the minimum requirements--at least a master’s degree, three years of full-time or faculty experience at an accredited college or university and two years as an administrator or manager in business, education or government. At least six candidates will be interviewed in person and, of those, three will be referred to the board.

The board will then decide who is to be the next Pierce College president by the end of the spring semester, Carter said.

Krahn, who will represent the Academic Senate on the search committee, said she will look for someone with strong public-relations skills who can articulate positions within and outside the district. Critics of Inocencio, including the board that voted in November not to renew his contract, said he was out of touch with the community surrounding Pierce College and failed to build consensus around his ideas.

“Bing was a good leader who was able to mobilize groups on campus,” said Martin Mota, a search committee member and the head of the Pierce College Council, a group of faculty and staff overseeing proposals for the new golf course and biotech park. “But he didn’t work well with the community and he didn’t work well with the district, and ultimately that’s where we had our funding base.

“Whoever replaces him will have to be able to understand a large bureaucracy.”

Inocencio declined to discuss his departure.

A state audit in December said that “costly board policies and poor management at all levels have significantly contributed to the district’s financial woes.” Although the board approved a plan to decentralize the district and give its nine community colleges more autonomy, auditors said improvements have been relatively insignificant thus far.

But others on campus say things have changed for Pierce College, until now a prime example of the district’s woes. With its proposed private-public-sector partnerships, the installation of much-needed air-conditioning units over the next year and repairs of the campus’ most decrepit classrooms already underway, some say the college could be on the cusp of recovery.

Pierce College has also undertaken a large Americans With Disabilities Act improvement project to rid the campus of obstructions for disabled people.

“I see a lot of really wonderful things happening,” said Dean of Academic Affairs Michael Cornner, another search committee member. “I think we may have turned the corner.”

Some say that is an optimistic view, and Cornner acknowledged that success will depend on a special kind of campus leader.

“I’m looking for somebody who will make two or three speeches a week off the campus and have excellent press relations and symbolizes the progress the campus is making,” Cornner said. “You’re looking for the sun, the moon and the stars. You’re looking for a superstar that will have all the right answers and lead you in the right directions.

“Ultimately, what we’ll find is a human being.”