New Regents President Bruce Rastetter Has No Mandate Or Public Trust

Iowa Board of Regents unanimously elects scandal-ridden Bruce Rastetter as new president

Corporate-political kingpin Bruce Rastetter is the new president of the Iowa Board of Regents, but his ability to effectively lead the board is in serious doubt because there is no public trust in him to put the common good before corporate profit after months of controversy surrounding him and his predecessor Craig Lang.  Lang was removed from the board by the Iowa Senate in April over concerns about academic freedom and corporate control at Iowa’s public universities.“Rastetter lost the trust of everyday Iowans a long time ago and a very skeptical public is going to be watching his every move as president like a hawk,” said Ross Grooters, a CCI member from Pleasant Hill. “He’s shown time and time again that he views Iowa’s public universities as nothing more than a tool to further his own pro-corporate agenda.”

Iowa CCI members demand newly elected Regents President Rastetter publicly state whether or not he supports the accountability, transparency, and ethics reform proposals made by the citizen action group such as public comment time at every regents meeting, an end to revolving door lobbying between regents institutions and private corporations, and a clear-cut enforcement process for the Regents internal ethics policy.

“Rastetter has an extremely narrow opportunity here to change course and actually shine a light on how decisions are made at the Regents, the question is, will he take it?” Grooters said.

Join us!  The Regents Transparency Taskforce will hold their next meeting in Des Moines from 9:00am-noon on Wednesday, June 19, 2013.  Meet at the CCI statewide headquarters, 2001 Forest Avenue, Des Moines, at 8:00am.