Board of Regents Chancellor Roderick Groves’ proposal to increase the power of the Regency system, after NIU’s attempts to distance itself from the Regents, will help the cause for an NIU separate governing board.

Sen. Patrick Welch, D-Peru, said Groves’ actions are “obviously a reaction to the independence movement” entrenched at NIU and Illinois State University at Normal.

“I think it is a mistake on the part of the chancellor to push this (policy change) as hard as he has,” he said.

Welch was the principal sponsor of SB0001, which called for a separate governing board for NIU, which would replace the Board of Regents. The board governs NIU, ISU in Normal, and Sangamon State University in Springfield.

Welch said Groves’ proposal “goes too far” in attempting to pull a hold on NIU and ISU’s independence movement and will “help the movement toward NIU getting its own governing board.”

“I think the purpose of the chancellorship when it was first formed wasn’t to create a buffer between the Board of Regents and the presidents,” but to help the Regency universities to communicate with the legislature and each other, he said.

The proposal was not a power grab, Welch explained, but “a shift of power in an attempt to rein in the independence movement.”

Although Welch said the move was not unexpected or surprising, the legislature has not collectively had the opportunity to form an opinion about the situation because the proposal was made after the legislative session recessed.

Welch said future involvement by the legislature is unlikely because it would invite other universities to tap into the legislature for action when unpopular decisions are made by their individual governing bodies.

“I doubt that the legislature would get involved,” in the authority making process of an educational governing body. In doing so, the legislature might be asked to “review all educational systems and set up governing rules for each,” he said.

Reports by the ISU newspaper, The Daily Vidette, about the possibilities of pressure from Gov. James Thompson’s office to smooth differences between the board and the Regency universities were refuted by Welch as illogical, explaining that such a notion would have come directly from the board.