In the latest development of the ongoing trustee election debate, a group calling itself "the Committee to Save Dartmouth College" placed an advertisement on The New York Times website's homepage Thursday urging readers to "support democracy" and directing them to SaveDartmouth.org, a website which criticizes potential changes to the makeup of the Board of Trustees.
The ad -- which costs $39 per thousand views, according to The Times' media website -- represents the most high-profile move to date to rally support for an 1891 document that, some argue, requires half of the seats on the Board of Trustees not filled by the College president and the governor of New Hampshire to be selected by alumni. This arrangement has come into question since May, when then-Chairman of the Board Bill Neukom '64 announced that a committee would be examining the Board's make-up and the selection process.
The CSDC issued a press release Thursday announcing a national advertising campaign levied against any change to the current arrangement. The release stated that the ad will also run on The Times website all day Sunday, and that future ads will run in the print editions of The Times and The Wall Street Journal. The release estimated the cost of the campaign to be $300,000.
"CSDC was formed in 2007 to educate Dartmouth graduates about a disturbing plan to discontinue the 116-year-old tradition of allowing them to elect one-half of the College's Trustees," the organization's website says. "We are young and old, male and female, liberal and conservative (and centrist). We are men and women of Dartmouth, and we care deeply about the future direction of the College."
SaveDartmouth.org asserts: "It pains us to see Dartmouth in turmoil, but the current controversy is of the Dartmouth Administration's own making."
The only name listed on the group's website is "Andres Morton Zimmerman" -- the names of three residence halls in the East Wheelock residential cluster on campus. An e-mail request sent to the contact listed was not returned by press time.
It is the policy of The New York Times, according to Abbe Serphos, director of public relations for the paper, is not to disclose the names of individuals responsible for booking an advertisement.
The posting of the ad follows the most recent trustee election in which leading candidates spent over $75,000 on their campaigns and which resulted in the election of Stephen Smith '88, the fourth consecutive petition candidate to gain a seat on the Board. The petition candidates are traditionally critical of the College administration.
In June, the Board of Trustees' governance committee announced that its reexamination of the Board's composition had come at least partially in response to the current nature of trustee elections.
"The Alumni Trustee nomination process has recently taken on the characteristics of a partisan political campaign, becoming increasingly contentious, divisive, and costly for the participants," the governance committee, a sub-committee of the Board, said in a memorandum dated June 4. "Alumni have also raised questions about the fairness of the multiple-candidate, approval-voting and plurality-winner features of the process. We believe these issues must be addressed, lest many highly qualified alumni be dissuaded from seeking nomination."
The CSDC is highly critical of the governance committee's efforts.
"An unelected 'Governance Committee' (including Dartmouth President James Wright and four other Trustees) is thinking about re-writing the rules. For the first time in 116 years, Dartmouth alumni/ae could be disenfranchised completely," the organization's website says.
The CSDC's press release quotes two of its members, Alex Mooney '93, a Maryland state senator who as a petition candidate won a seat on the Dartmouth Association of Alumni executive committee in June, and Connecticut lawyer Richard Roberts '83. Messages left at Mooney's offices were not returned as of press time. Roberts' telephone number could not be located.
Calls to the group's press officer, Sarah Lindler, were not returned and the phone number's voicemail had not been activated by press time. The phone number has a Maryland area code. Lindler is not an alumna of the College.
The CSDC is the second organization to be formed in support of the current structure of alumni representation on the Board of Trustees. A group calling itself the 1891 Society placed an ad in The Dartmouth on July 6 that threatened the withholding of financial contributions to the College if the 1891 agreement is not upheld.
Like the CSDC, the 1891 Society has not been forthcoming with its composition, although both organizations claim sizeable membership. Robert Reed '49, who currently lives in Texas, sent the 1891 Society advertisement and a money order to The Dartmouth in an envelope whose return address had been obscured by a pen.
In responding to the CSDC's actions, College vice-president for Alumni Relations David Spalding '76 affirmed that the Board of Trustees is committed to hearing out all opinions on this matter.
"At this point I am not really sure how to react because I am not sure who is behind this group," he said. "There is passion on all sides of this issue and I think the Board has been very open to tap into the opinions of alums."
An article Friday ("Alumni group launches ad campaign," Aug. 17) incorrectly identified the cost of CSDC's advertisement as $39 per minute. It in fact is $39 per thousand views.
