S.C State board to stay the same, at least for now

A legislative subcommittee this week shot down a proposal to reorganize South Carolina State University's Board of Trustees.

Rep. Jerry Govan,D-Orangeburg, was the lead sponsor of a bill to shake up the board after the body chose last year not to renew former President Andrew Hugine's contract.

Hugine's firing stirred controversy on the Orangeburg campus in December. Board members claimed Hugine didn't posses the management skills necessary to take the school to the next level. But some alumni, including U.S. Rep Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., and several state legislators, were angered by the move, claiming Hugine had improved the school.

Now, 12 of the university's 13 board members are appointed by the state's General Assembly and one member is appointed by the governor.

Under Govan's plan, the school's current board would have been replaced on July 1 by six members appointed by the General Assembly, six by the South Carolina State University National Alumni Association and one by the governor.

The House's Education and Public Works' subcommittee on higher education Tuesday adjourned the bill until January 2009, essentially killing it, said state Rep. B.R. Skelton, R-Six Mile, the subcommittee chairman.

Read more in tomorrow's Post and Courier.