Ray Bellamy and Kent S. Miller My View

On the New York Times’ opinion pages of May 8, Timothy Egan wrote that David and Charles Koch used some of their $80 billion fortune “to attack the indisputable science on climate change, to buy junk scholars, to promote harmful legislation at the state level, to go after clean, renewable energy like solar, and to try to kill the greatest expansion of health care in decades.”

We have a narrower focus here, which is the relationship between the Kochs and Florida State University, recently in the papers once again.

Public universities particularly need to raise money from donors. So much so, it has become a major function of university presidents, reinforced by tying pay to success in bringing in the money. The Kochs know this and have spent many millions of dollars working their way into higher education, impacting the hiring of faculty, supporting “correct” students, influencing the curriculum and generally advancing their agenda.

They play loose with the truth (see PolitiFact.com regarding half-truths or falsehoods in the majority of their anti-health care ads, and note that Sen. Harry Reid has just labeled the Koch brothers as one of the causes of climate change). The Kochs work behind the cover provided by a network of ‘think tanks” and 501(c) organizations, Americans for Prosperity and DonorsTrust among them.

We understand that. The mystery for us comes in the readiness of FSU to be associated in any manner with forces that are in direct opposition to the basic tenets and principles of the university. Anyone reading the memorandum of understanding between the parties would have to conclude that the Kochs intended to influence the academic mission through the hiring and evaluation of faculty, and management of the curriculum. The several million dollars given to FSU came heavily wrapped in string.

The Faculty Senate Committee charged with reviewing the agreement made a number of recommendations, including the following: no more donor-funding hiring until a number of provisions are modified; the FSU Foundation should review its policies regarding gifts and update documents if necessary to ensure the autonomy and integrity of university’s academic mission; and review the role of the faculty in shared governance and primary responsibility of the faculty for the curriculum.

The fallout for FSU could have been much worse, but is not yet over. We hope there is a lesson learned here as the university advances in its designation as a Florida pre-eminent university.

Now back to Egan. He closes his column with the observation that the Kochs may win in the short game, but will ultimately fail. The forces for climate control, health care, etc. are too strong to be ignored. And we would add that the Kochs’ heavily funded efforts, some of them shown to be filled with disinformation, are contrary to much of the science being studied, researched and examined elsewhere on the campus.

Finally, we call attention to Florida’s increasingly limited access to governmental activities and lack of transparency. As we have tried to get information from various agencies, we have learned to expect “this is protected information.” What is it these people want to hide?

Ray Bellamy is a longtime Tallahassee physician. Contact him at ray_bellamy@yahoo.com. Kent S. Miller is emeritus professor of psychology at Florida State University. Contact him at ksmiller@fsu.edu.