Legislative Committee Recommends Board Extension

A State Legislative Committee has recommended an extension of the Tennessee Tech Board Of Trustees’ governance of the University for another five years.

Trustees Chair Trudy Harper said the state process essentially operates as a zero-based budgeting approach to the need for boards and commission. The state established the Board of Trustees in 2016, marking this as the second sunset hearing.

“The state legislature sent us 24 questions, we sent back 22 pages of answers plus 35 exhibits,” Harper said. “It was a lot. It was a lot of information that we spent a lot of time working on. The whole administrative team worked with me and we all prepared this. And again, this is a review of our performance. This isn’t a review of the university per se. It’s a review of the board.”

Tech President Phil Oldham said the five-year recommendation from the committee not typical. Oldham said it showed the success of the board in governing the University.

“It went incredibly well,” Oldham said. “You never know when you go before a joint committee of the legislature what what you’re going to be asked and and particularly in today’s environment. It was uncertain, but to get five years was remarkable. That was not the norm. A lot of other boards got much less than five years, and so I think it does show a lot of confidence in in what this board is doing here at Tennessee Tech. So I think you all should be very proud of that.”

The Legislature and Governor will make the final decision on the governance in the coming months.