State launches full-scale investigation into FAU’s presidential search

The state will launch a formal investigation into Florida Atlantic University’s presidential search, rejecting the university’s request to end the matter quickly and increasing speculation that the ultimate goal is to place a political ally of Gov. Ron DeSantis into the role.

The inspector general for the Board of Governors, the policy-making body for the state’s public universities, will conduct a formal investigation into “anomalies” in FAU’s presidential search, System Chancellor Ray Rodrigues wrote in a letter this week to Brad Levine, who chairs the FAU search firm and Board of Trustees.

“The investigation will be thorough, fair, and a determination will not be reached in haste,” Rodrigues wrote to Levine. “The search process will remain suspended until the conclusion of our investigation. We look forward to your continued cooperation and engagement in this matter.”

The letter is dated Tuesday but FAU received it Wednesday, said university spokeswoman Lisa Metcalf, who provided it to the South Florida Sun Sentinel on Thursday afternoon.

FAU was set to hold public forums for the three finalists this week until Rodrigues sent a letter Friday afternoon asking it to be paused, citing two concerns. Rodrigues questioned a search committee’s use of secret ballots in the first round of narrowing candidates as well as a search firm’s voluntary questionnaire that asked about applicants’ sexual orientation and gender identity.

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In letters sent Saturday and Monday to Rodrigues, Levine argued that the committee’s votes were legal and even supported by FAU’s lawyer and a member of the Board of Governors who sat on the search committee.

Levine’s letter also said the search committee had no knowledge that their hired firm, AGB Search, conducted a survey with LGBTQ-related questions on them.

Levine said the questions were optional and asked anonymously for the firm’s internal purposes after applications were submitted. Similar demographic surveys were conducted in other recent state university searches, Levine wrote.

“With respect to a candidate being asked if they were queer, you acknowledge that ‘FAU learned, for the first time, that AGB Search sent [such] a questionnaire to the candidates for research purposes,’ and was not authorized to do so by FAU. You agreed that ‘such a questionnaire is [un]warranted for a State University search in Florida,” Rodrigues wrote.

Critics, including FAU faculty, Democratic politicians and a major donor, are blasting the decision to delay the search, questioning whether the state’s ultimate desire is to give the job to Randy Fine, a socially conservative Republican legislator from Palm Bay whom the DeSantis administration supported for the job.

Fine is a former casino gambling executive with an MBA from Harvard.

Giving the job to Fine would fit a recent pattern of DeSantis allies getting lucrative higher education jobs, as the governor looks to make universities less “woke” by banning the use of state dollars for diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, critics say.

In March, a board made of DeSantis appointees fired the president of the traditionally liberal New College of Florida in Sarasota and replaced her with Richard Corcoran, a former House Speaker who DeSantis previously tapped to serve as state education commissioner. Last month, State Rep. Fred Hawkins, another DeSantis ally, was named president of South Florida State College in Avon Park.

“Of course, the whole process has been politicized. Of course, it’s going to be a return of New College. Of course, DeSantis is going to get what he wants because that is what’s been happening,” predicted State Rep. Kelly Skidmore, D-West Boca. “FAU is trying to do the right thing, but I feel strongly they will acquiesce to the pressure and they will appoint Randy Fine. I have no doubt at some point that will happen.”

State Sen. Lori Berman’s south Palm Beach County district includes FAU. She said she’s “extremely upset” that the search was suspended.

“I have to question if there’s a political motive, given we know the search was done in a proper manner,” she said. “FAU is becoming a top university. They got three excellent candidates. We should continue to move forward with those candidates.”

The FAU search committee selected as the three finalists Vice Admiral Sean Buck, superintendent of the U.S. Naval Academy; Michael Hartline, dean of the College of Business at Florida State University; and Jose Sartarelli, former Chancellor of the University of North Carolina Wilmington.

Philanthropist Dick Schmidt, whose family has donated more than $47 million to FAU, served on the search committee. In a Sun Sentinel opinion piece, he voiced alarm at what he sees as political interference by the state.

“I feel personally outraged and slandered by the implications of the chancellor’s letter on me and my colleagues, for what appears to be an attempt to unwind our successful, hard work and reopen a search for a candidate more to the liking of certain politicians,” he wrote.

Fine told the Sun Sentinel in March he was seriously considering the job. And DeSantis’ office in late March backed the idea of Fine becoming the next FAU president: “Rep. Fine has been a leader on education issues, and we think he’d be a good candidate for the role,” Communications Director Taryn Fenske said at the time.

FAU won’t confirm that Fine actually applied, citing a state law that keeps secret the names of applicants who don’t advance to the final three. Several members of the search committee said they had to sign a non-disclosure agreement.

Fine has said three times in the past two weeks, including Thursday, that he refuses to talk to the Sun Sentinel.

The Board of Governors “will not have a further comment until the investigation concludes. However long that takes,” spokeswoman Renee Fargason said Thursday afternoon.

Some lawyers say the issues raised by the chancellor are legitimate and should be investigated.

“For me, it’s about the process. Did you follow the process?” asked Kevin Tynan, a Republican who DeSantis appointed last year for a brief stint on the Broward School Board. “If there’s a question, you take a step back and do it right.”

Will Spicola, a Tallahassee attorney who specializes in constitutional law, said the issues raised related to an initial vote tally are troublesome. Although a law passed last year now requires search committee meetings to be held behind closed doors, meeting records should still reflect how search committee members vote, he said.

“Everyone still has to be accountable,” he said.

He said he believes the meetings may need to be held over again, which is similar to how meetings that are required to be held in the open are cured.

Bill Trapani, a professor at FAU who applied for the presidency job as a way to voice concerns about Fine, said he questions the state’s motives in suspending the search. He said the application deadline was May 16 and the closed-door meeting was May 19, but no concerns about the process were raised until after it was announced that Fine didn’t make the final cut.

“I think it will be a protracted investigation long enough for the candidates who have been identified to move on or find this so distasteful for an experience they withdraw,” he said. “These candidates have no idea if they will be getting calls to be in a public forum next week, next month, next year or never.”

The Sun Sentinel contacted the three finalists Thursday and was able to reach Buck and Sartarelli, who both said they are staying in for now. Hartline could not be reached for comment.

Buck said he’s scheduled to retire from the U.S. Navy in early September.

“As for my intention, I’m still proud to be one of those three,” he said. “I’m sticking around. I’m still serving in active duty and not going anywhere until the first of September.”