Imagine that after a long day working at the Arizona State Capital, Gov. Doug Ducey flies home to Needles, Calif., or Supreme Court Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy returns to his regular residence in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, where none of the judicial opinions he helped pen that day were in effect.
While most people would find such situations antithetical to the ethics of serving in an administrative office representing a particular regional constituency, not so at Yavapai College. In fact, at the college, that’s how things are done.
Despite being hired for the post three years ago, Yavapai College’s Verde Valley Campus Dean James Perey has lived in Chino Valley ever since. The college recently announced that Prescott resident Kelly Trainor will take over as the new associate dean of the Verde Valley campus. Perhaps if Trainor was a new hire, he would consider moving from wherever to the Verde Valley, but as a 10-year employee of Yavapai College, he’s unlikely to move any time soon, or ever, given the fact that his boss hasn’t either.
So when local students complain about the financial difficulty of driving 90 minutes one way just to take a single class, or spending limited money on child care while they earn credits toward their degree, or they have to drop out because of car problems, or work concerns, or because a three-hour-a-day, three-day a week drive just ceases to be worth the hassle, don’t expect Perey or Trainor to have any sympathy — not when offset by their six-figure salaries.
A lot of phrases come to mind when we think of how Yavapai College views the Verde Valley, but “I think the Verde Valley is getting shafted,” is perhaps the best, spoken by none other than Yavapai College District Governing Board member Deb McCasland, who along with Governing Board member Al Filardo, represents Verde Valley interests.
Yet despite McCasland and Filardo’s objections, the decision about whom to hire, from where, and where they must reside was passed from the board to the authority of Yavapai College President Penny Wills, who has shown disdain for Sedona and the Verde Valley and our students, while continuing to milk our communities for tax money. As long as the three Prescott area Governing Board members continue to outvote McCasland and Filardo, nothing will get done without help from Arizona state legislators.
Deans who do not live in the Verde Valley do not hear concerns from neighbors, nor do they bump into residents at the grocery store, nor do they enroll their children at Mingus Union, Camp Verde nor Sedona Red Rock high schools and hear about their children’s friends’ college plans. They have no community connection to the Verde Valley, which perhaps is exactly what Wills wants: Hired guns who are loyal to her alone and not to the students and teachers on their campus.
