ND higher ed board to hold second special meeting on Shirvani

Talk about it

BISMARCK – North Dakota’s State Board of Higher Education will hold its second special meeting this month regarding Chancellor Hamid Shirvani on Thursday.

A meeting notice for the 2 p.m. conference call, which will originate from the Bismarck State College campus, was released Tuesday afternoon. The agenda lists one item, “discussion of Board support for Chancellor Shirvani.”

President Duaine Espegard said the call will give the board another chance for discussion one week after the release of a report by University System General Counsel Claire Holloway following her week-long investigation into allegations against the embattled chancellor, including that he had instructed staff to intentionally ignore state open meeting laws.

Holloway said Thursday that her inquiry found “no substantive evidence of willful wrongdoing” on the part of Shirvani, who has served as chancellor since July 1. The allegations were raised during the board’s March 7 regular meeting by student representative Sydney Hull, who said the claims were brought forward by past and present central office staff in Bismarck.

Espegard said he scheduled this week’s meeting to follow up on Holloway’s report.

“It was 200 and some pages that she provided there, and it looked like everything was pretty well explained,” he said. “Everybody has had a chance to look at it, so we’ll take a look at it this week and see if there’s anything else needed or what’s going on.”

Espegard said he doesn’t expect it to be a contentious meeting, and guessed the call would be finished within an hour.

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