UNC Board of Governors Moves Meeting Amid Planned Protests

The UNC Board of Governors has changed the location for its scheduled meeting on Friday amid “potential for large numbers of protesters,” according to UNC System spokesperson Joni Worthington.

The meeting was scheduled to take place at UNC – Asheville but instead will now be held at the Center for School Leadership Development in Chapel Hill.

Worthington wrote in an e-mail that UNC – Asheville Chancellor Mary Grant spoke with newly-installed System President Margaret Spellings and board chair Lou Bissette over the weekend about the “potential for large numbers of protesters at the Board meetings and the disruption that might cause to academic and other activities at UNC – Asheville.”

Worthington wrote that the campus and system leadership came to a “mutual decision” to relocate the meetings.

Worthington did add that Spellings’ visit to the Asheville campus as part of the statewide tour of UNC campuses will go on as scheduled this week.

Spellings and the search that led to her appointment replacing Tom Ross have been a lightning rod over the last year, including four students being arrested at a January meeting. Protesters staged walk-outs on campuses across the state on March 1 to align with Spellings’ first official day as President.

Protests have reignited in recent days since the passing of North Carolina’s controversial House Bill 2. After Spellings sent a memo out to all of the UNC campuses last week regarding the circumstances surrounding the legislation, LGBT advocacy groups criticized the President. Spellings then spoke with reporters last Friday attempting to clarify hers and the System’s stance on the law. Spellings called the legislation “hastily drawn, perhaps without fully considering all of the implications that were at hand.”

Spellings added that her memo was “in no way an endorsement of this law. That’s not my job. I’m not a member of the North Carolina General Assembly. I’m a state office holder who is charged with upholding the laws of this state. We are not in a position to pick and choose which laws.”