April 26, 2004
Dear Alumni:
In recent weeks a number of our members have received a
letter from Vice Admiral Ryan responding to letters written by them to
Chancellor King of the State University of New York regarding the circumstances
that currently exist between SUNY and the College and the Alumni Association.
To date, the Alumni Association has received copies of 6
such letters. The text of the letters is identical and, regrettably, there are
several statements contained therein which are inaccurate and require
clarification for the record. These statements, which are excerpted verbatim
from Vice Admiral Ryan’s letter(s), and the Alumni Association responses
follow:
1. Vice Admiral
Ryan “Despite what you have
been told, the purpose of this agreement was not to exercise any control over
these affiliated organizations, wrestle away any endowments they may have, or
muzzle their right to speak out on issues regarding their campuses. In fact,
the agreement guaranteed, the Association's right to maintain its
independence. The purpose of the agreement was for the affiliated organizations
bearing the College's name to have a formal understanding on how they will
coordinate their activities. The agreement simply required your Association to
work in conjunction with Maritime College, and to recognize that the President
of the College provides campus leadership and sets campus priorities.”
Alumni Association The first two clauses of the SUNY-mandated
agreement have been copied directly from the agreement and are as follows:
“1. The Association
will conduct its activities in accordance with the policies of the Campus as
decided by the president and the State University, including the Board of
Trustees' Guidelines for Alumni Associations, attached hereto and made a part
hereof as Exhibit A, and as may be amended by State University from time to
time.
2. The Association will conduct all of its activities
exclusively for the benefit of the Campus. Additional activities must be
approved in writing as an amendment to this
agreement.”
The
Alumni Association was never chartered to “conduct all of its activities
exclusively for the benefit of the Campus.” The Association is first and
foremost a fraternal organization dedicated to its membership and their
professional interests and camaraderie. Secondarily, the Association supports
the college and that is why it has been structured under IRS Tax Code as a 501
(c) 3 Charitable Organization. The stated purpose of the Alumni Association is
“… to work actively and effectively to advance the professional interests of
the Maritime College of the State University of New York, its alumni, faculty
and students.” There is a lot more here than that which exclusively benefits
the Campus at any given point in time, and the requirement that any activities,
other than those which are exclusively for the benefit of the Campus, must be
approved in writing would appear
to both “exercise control” over and limit the Alumni Association’s “right to maintain its independence”, but we leave that
for you to decide.
Please
click HERE for a complete copy of the
SUNY-mandated agreement. You can interpret the document for yourself and then
weigh it against Vice Admiral Ryan’s aforesaid statement. Please pay particular
attention to the indemnity and termination clauses.
2. Vice Admiral Ryan “On the subject of "grandfathering”,
whi1e it was mentioned in the
Resolution, complete grandfathering as requested by the Alumni Leadership has
not been granted to any alumni association. It was only mentioned as a
contingency for short time periods, so that an Association could correct a
small issue in case of special circumstances. The Association never presented
me with any special circumstances that would have prevented it from operating
effectively after signing the agreement. Therefore; I did not forward a request
to the Chancellor.”
Alumni
Association To begin with, we
are bewildered to hear that Vice Admiral Ryan did not forward the Alumni
Association’s request for “Grandfathering” to the Chancellor, as requested by
the Alumni Association President by letter dated June 20, 2003 and twice again
subsequently thereafter.
By Memorandum dated May 16, 2003, Brian T. Stenson,
Office of the Vice Chancellor Finance and Business at the State University of
New York, advised campus presidents that State University of New York Trustees
had approved a resolution adopting
guidelines for campus-related foundations and ASC’s, and new guidelines for Alumni Associations.
Contained therein, among other things, Stenson states “Because of the nature of
certain activities and arrangements, it may be necessary for those activities
to be grandfathered on an exception basis. While
we would expect that the need for exceptions would be limited, if a campus feels it is necessary, a written
request to do so should be sent to my office for review.”
On this basis, by letter dated June 20, 2003, the
then president of the Alumni Association wrote to Vice Admiral Ryan requesting
a grandfathering of the Alumni Association. As you can see, there is nothing
contained in Stenson’s memorandum indicating that grandfathering “was only
mentioned as a contingency for short time periods, so that an Association could
correct a small issue in case of special circumstances.” As for the statement “complete
grandfathering has not been granted to any alumni association,” why include it
in the guidelines if it is not an option?
Further, Vice Admiral Ryan surely understands that
(i) the Alumni Association predates SUNY by almost 50 years and that a large
percentage of the membership are not even SUNY graduates; (ii) the Alumni
Association has consistently been one of the most active alumni associations in
the SUNY System in terms of financial and political support; (iii) the Maritime
College is unique in all of SUNY operating under General Order 84 and subject
to federal takeover in time of war; and (iv) the only SUNY unit with an
appointment scholarship program.
For all of these reasons, the Alumni Association
should have been at least considered
for grandfathering. As we now find out, Vice Admiral Ryan did not even forward
the request to the Chancellor, but instead says “The Association never
presented me with any special circumstances that would have prevented it from
operating effectively after signing the agreement. Therefore; I did not forward
a request to the Chancellor.” If Vice Admiral Ryan sincerely felt this way,
then that should have been communicated to the Alumni Association. Instead, by
letter dated July 25, 2003, Vice Admiral Ryan responded to the Alumni
Association by stating:
“Appreciate your letter of June 20, 2003, regarding
the new SUNY Guidelines for Campus-Related Alumni Associations. SUNY has
indicated they will soon publish a standard contract to serve as a model for
all 64 campuses. I suggest we wait for
this form prior to proceeding.”
3. Vice
Admiral Ryan “Finally, regarding the Association's decision to sever
its long relationship with Maritime College, you may not know that I was
prevented from communicating my feelings on this issue with the Association's
membership. A great deal of time was spent preparing material that detailed the
reasons I felt it was in the best interest of the College and the Association
to have a signed agreement. I presented this briefing to your Board, but the
Leadership of the Association chose not to place it in the information with
your ballot. Had I been able to send you this material, you would have learned
that if the Association did vote to reject the agreement, it would sever its
ties to the College and would be asked to leave its offices on campus. The
Leadership had at least six weeks notice that this would occur. In fact, it is
my understanding that the Association had already moved its computer servers
and files from their offices in the very first week of January, in anticipation
of the announcement that it was severing
its ties to the College. Again, it is also my understanding that none of this
was communicated to the voting membership by the Association Leadership.”
Alumni
Association The Alumni Association did not “sever its long relationship
with Maritime College.” SUNY
and the College demanded that the Alumni Association enter into an agreement
and if it did not, the relationship between SUNY and the College and the Alumni
Association would be severed. It is disingenuous of Vice Admiral Ryan to make
this assertion, as there were no negotiations
in this matter, only a demand and an ultimatum “take it or leave it - or else.”
The Alumni Association could not “take it” without a vote by the membership and this vote was
overwhelmingly in favor of not “taking it.”
Vice Admiral Ryan further states “I was prevented
from communicating my feelings on this issue with the Association's
membership.” Vice Admiral Ryan was given ample opportunity to communicate with
the membership as evidenced by an email exchange between the then
president of the Alumni Association
and the College Development Officer. We are quite surprised by Vice Admiral
Ryan’s repeated assertion to this effect, when nothing could be further from the truth.
As for Vice Admiral Ryan’s statement “…you would have
learned that if the Association did vote to reject the agreement, it would
sever its ties to the College and would be asked to leave its offices on
campus… Again, it is also my understanding that none of this was communicated
to the voting membership by the
Association Leadership”, this statement is misleading and untrue.
All of the correspondence relating to this matter has been
posted on the Alumni website for all to read and for all to make their own
judgment. Further, contained in the package which was sent with each and every
ballot prior to the vote, was a complete listing of this correspondence and
where it could be found on the Alumni Association website. Additionally, a full
description of what might happen if a vote in favor of “Proposition One”
prevailed was given.
Proposition One was described as a vote to “Affirm the
Alumni Association’s current for of organization and modus operandi in light of
the current circumstances.” On page one
of the “Ballot Propositions Described”, which was mailed to all members in good
standing prior to the vote, Proposition One was described as follows:
“The Board of Directors and Officers of the Association are
hereby directed to take whatever action is necessary, whether legal and/or
administrative, and whether aimed at reorganization or defense, to maintain the
independence of the Association and control of its assets (staff, data,
monetary) even under peril of loss of formal recognition by the College and
under peril of being requested by SUNY and/or the College to vacate the campus
and change the Association’s name.”
For Vice Admiral Ryan to assert that all of the
necessary information was not provided to the membership prior to the vote is
simply not true. Further, if Vice Admiral Ryan sincerely felt that his side of
the issue needed to be communicated to the membership, we question why he did
not take advantage of the Alumni Association’s offer to do so.
Finally, as regards Vice Admiral Ryan’s statement “In fact,
it is my understanding that the Association had already moved its computer
servers and files from their offices in the very first week of January, in
anticipation of the announcement that it was severing its ties to the College”
is, once again disingenuous and inaccurate. The Association, in anticipation of
an overwhelming vote in favor of independence, and thus implementation of
SUNY’s threat to the Association of “being requested by SUNY and/or the College
to vacate the campus,” the Association took the prudent step of removing some
sensitive property such as computers and files prior to the vote tally.
Interestingly enough, as soon as SUNY and the College received word of the vote
on January 30, 2004, the Alumni Association was ordered off the campus by
letter from university counsel that same day, and given exactly one business day to comply with
the SUNY ultimatum. Once again, we urge
you to visit the Alumni website, read the complete file of correspondence for
yourself, and then decide for yourself the accuracy of the issues being debated.
Your Alumni Board has been working tirelessly to
resolve this situation to the satisfaction of the membership and in a way that
will best serve the needs of the Alumni first and foremost and then the
College, all in a way that will allow your Alumni Association to continue to
support the College as it has, along with its predecessor institutions, now for
the past 101 years.
We are genuinely disturbed by Vice Admiral Ryan’s
continued unwillingness to communicate with the Alumni Association regarding
this matter (we assume at SUNY’s direction) and other issues relating to the
College and the Alumni Association’s relationship. For example, in advance of
the Alumni Association’s 100th Anniversary Dinner Dance, the Alumni
Association’s president wrote to Vice Admiral Ryan requesting that the College
Chaplain and the Color Guard be permitted to attend, along with encouraging
Cadets to attend free of charge for networking opportunities with the Alumni.
Vice Admiral Ryan did not respond to this request. Additionally, Vice Admiral
Ryan and his wife were
invited as guests to this event and, once again, no response.
Given the fact that SUNY
and Vice Admiral Ryan will not communicate with the Association, the Alumni
Association Board is now working with various legislators in Albany to try and
resolve the situation. We all regret that the situation has gotten to this
point, but your Alumni Association did not initiate this problem. We were given
an ultimatum and, as our fiduciary responsibilities dictate, we then went to
the membership-at-large for a decision on this matter. The membership
overwhelming expressed their decision to take the path that the Alumni
Association Board is now embarked upon.
College Foundation has no basis in fact. On one hand,
we have the Maritime College Foundation which has, as it sole purpose, the
exclusive support of the College. It is essentially “owned” by the College and
serves one function – fundraising for the College. Your Alumni Association, on
the other hand, is a 101 year old organization, made up of over 7,000 graduates
of the SUNY Maritime College and its predecessor institutions, with the primary
mission of being a fraternal organization dedicated to its membership and their
professional interests and camaraderie The Alumni Association was never
chartered to conduct all of its activities exclusively for the benefit of the
Campus and does not have the primary function of fundraising for the
College.
The Alumni Association will continue to promote the
professional interests and camaraderie of its membership and, at the same,
support the College. We hope this clarifies the statements contained in Vice
Admiral Ryan’s letter and answers why we are where we are today.
We urge all Alumni to review the information posted
HERE . All correspondence relating to this matter is posted there. It will
require some time to read through all of it, but after doing so, you will be
well informed in this matter.
Fraternally,
The Executive Committee
Enclsoures
