COEUR D’ALENE, Idaho – For North Idaho College standards, Monday’s regularly scheduled Board of Trustees meeting was relatively tame, even though it featured the replacement of (now former) Board Chair Greg McKenzie, replacing him with Trustee Mike Waggoner.
For most of his tenure, which started last November, Waggoner has acted as a bridge between the voting block of Trustees Tarie Zimmerman and Brad Corkill against the block of Trustees Todd Banducci and McKenzie.
The former pair have generally aligned with and supported current President Nick Swayne, while McKenzie and Banducci have often clashed heads with Swayne. In fact, it was in McKenzie’s first full meeting as chair last December when the board decided to place Swayne on administrative leave. Zimmerman and Corkill later unsuccessfully voted to remove the administrative leave, and it wasn’t until a March 2023 court decision that Swayne was reinstated as college president.
While McKenzie himself barely commented on the process, the rest of the board seemed united in their choice. Waggoner and Zimmerman have been serving on a subcommittee to create new board policies, which McKenzie attempted to micromanage at last month’s meeting.
Zimmerman said his cooperation in the subcommittee played a big part in her decision to nominate him for chair.
“His leadership has been outstanding. He’s come to every meeting prepared,” Zimmerman said. “He can grab us all together and gather some consensus.”
Banducci agreed with Zimmerman, saying he would’ve nominated Waggoner if she hadn’t.
Waggoner is now the fourth board chair North Idaho College has had since May 2022, all while under heat from the Northwest Commission of Colleges and Universities (NWCCU), who have threatened to pull the college’s accreditation if the school doesn’t improve in several areas.
In a report this spring, they said, “The college President and Board of Trustees, individually and collectively, bear the great and vitally important responsibility of figuring out how to work together in a spirit of peace and unity to govern the college effectively.” In multiple meetings since the report, McKenzie and Swayne butted heads, especially on the issue of who should serve as the college’s attorney.
With the NWCCU visiting recently and a new report coming shortly, Zimmerman thought Waggoner would be the best choice to lead the board.
“With our most recent visit from the commission and what we’ve gotten in July, it’s apparent that the board leadership and board governance continues to be a problem,” Zimmerman said. “I think that we need a change in the board chair.”
Right before the vote, Waggoner committed to trying to bring everyone together.
“Our college thrives on growth, learning and inclusivity,” he said. “We need unity and collaboration among the board and the administration… I think we need to go forward with a shared, positive vision.”
