Dear Commons Community,

This is something a little different for this blog.  It was announced that the Professional Golf Association (PGA) Tour is moving a key tour date away from a course owned by Donald Trump and relocating it to Mexico.

According to CNN:

The World Golf Championship tournament — a top-tier event — has been held at Miami’s Doral resort since the 1960s, but will be moved to Mexico City in 2017, to a course to be confirmed, and renamed the WGC-Mexico Championship.

PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem insisted that the decision was a financial one, and not related to Trumps’ political ambitions.

“Some of the reaction revolves around the feeling that this is political exercise, and it is not that in any way, shape or form,” Finchem said during a press conference.

“The decision here was based on the reality that we are not able to secure sponsorship for next year’s WGC at Doral or for years out for that matter.”  

Trump’s response was:

“I just heard that the PGA Tour is taking their tournament out of Miami and moving it to Mexico,” he said. “They’re moving it to Mexico City — which, by the way, I hope they have kidnapping insurance. But they’re moving it to Mexico City. And I’m saying, you know, what’s going on here? It’s so sad when you look what’s going on with our country.”

The big question is why deep-money sponsors have not come forward.  Could it have anything to do with not wanting to associate themselves with Trump? 

Professional golfer Rory Mcllroy, however, had that best line:

“It’s quite ironic that we’re going to Mexico after being at Doral,” McIlroy said. “We just jump over the wall.”

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Verizon, the Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers reached a tentative agreement on a new contract thereby ending a six-week long strike.   As reported in The Huffington Post:

“Labor Secretary Tom Perez said Friday that telecom giant Verizon and two unions representing its workers reached a tentative agreement that will end a massive, six-week strike.

In a statement, Perez said the parties had resolved their remaining issues “in principle,” but were still hammering out the contract language. Once that is done, the unions — the Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers — will submit the contract to membership for ratification.

“This tentative resolution is a testament to the power of collective bargaining,” Perez said. “I commend the leadership of Verizon, CWA, and IBEW for their commitment to resolving these difficult issues in the spirit of constructive engagement.”

Verizon technicians and customer service reps for the company’s wireline phone business first walked off the job in mid-April. By modern U.S. standards, the work stoppage is huge — including some 37,000 workers, stretching from the Northeast through the mid-Atlantic. It is the largest U.S. strike in five years and has begun to hurt business for Verizon, which owns AOL, The Huffington Post’s parent company.

The two sides had already resolved questions over pay and benefits for workers, but were hung up on contract language that would enable Verizon to outsource work. The unions were adamantly opposed to giving the company that ability. It isn’t clear yet how that issue plays in the tentative agreement.”

It is good to see that collective bargaining is alive and well in the U.S.A.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Federal Judge Gonzalo Curiel made public yesterday court documents from a case brought against the now-defunct Trump University.  The release of the documents under court order, was the latest turn in a federal lawsuit filed in California by dissatisfied former Trump University students in 2010.  As reported by the New York Times:

“Mr. Trump, who started the university in 2005, owned 93 percent of the now-defunct company. From the start, he acted as its chief promoter, rather than day-to-day manager, selling it as a tool of financial empowerment that would improve life for thousands of ordinary Americans. It would, he said, “teach you better than the best business school,” according to the transcript of a Web video…

“In blunt testimony revealed on Tuesday, former managers of Trump University, the for-profit school started by Donald J. Trump, portray it as an unscrupulous business that relied on high-pressure sales tactics, employed unqualified instructors, made deceptive claims and exploited vulnerable students willing to pay tens of thousands for Mr. Trump’s insights.

One sales manager for Trump University, Ronald Schnackenberg, recounted how he was reprimanded for not pushing a financially struggling couple hard enough to sign up for a $35,000 real estate class, despite his conclusion that it would endanger their economic future. He watched with disgust, he said, as a fellow Trump University salesman persuaded the couple to purchase the class anyway.

“I believe that Trump University was a fraudulent scheme,” Mr. Schnackenberg wrote in his testimony, “and that it preyed upon the elderly and uneducated to separate them from their money.”

For Mr. Trump, whose presidential campaign hinges on his reputation as a businessman, the newly unsealed documents offer an unflattering snapshot of his career since branching out, over the past decade, from building skyscrapers into endeavors that cashed in on his name to sell everything from water and steaks to ties and education.”

Donald Trump’s response to the release of the documents has been to go on a smear campaign of Judge Gonzalo Curiel. Trump has referred to Curiel as a Mexican who should be recused from the proceedings.  Curiel was born in Indiana.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Nancy L. Zimpher, chancellor of the State University of New York, the nation’s largest public university system, announced that she will resign in June 2017.  As reported in The New York Times:

“Nancy L. Zimpher, who has been credited with elevating the State University of New York, the nation’s largest public university system, since becoming chancellor seven years ago, is stepping down next year, the university announced yesterday

Dr. Zimpher has relentlessly promoted the system, through a strategic plan called “The Power of SUNY,” as an engine of economic growth and community development. She has also sought to raise academic standards and has made it easier for students to transfer within SUNY’s sprawling system of 64 campuses, which serves 460,000 full-time and part-time students.

Dr. Zimpher, who will turn 70 in October, is also SUNY’s longest-serving chancellor since the mid-1980s. She said in an interview that she would not be retiring but would continue to be active in various state and national initiatives, including teacher preparation.

“The State University of New York is the greatest, most impactful system of higher education in the country, and being chancellor of SUNY has been the highlight of my career,” Dr. Zimpher said.

She has steered the university during a fraught time for public higher education. Since the 2008 recession, states have slashed per-student spending at public colleges and universities by 17 percent while tuition has increased by 33 percent, according to the nonpartisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

SUNY’s situation has been compounded by internal turmoil. In the 15 years before Dr. Zimpher’s arrival, SUNY had seven chancellors or acting chancellors, including a turbulent stretch around the time of Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s abrupt resignation, which included the withdrawal of some candidates.

“The effectiveness of the SUNY leadership since the early ’90s has not been great,” said Kenneth P. O’Brien, an associate professor of history at the College at Brockport and an editor of “SUNY at Sixty,” an analysis of the university’s history since its founding in 1948. “In some sense we have been gratified that the leadership that Chancellor Zimpher has provided has been rational, and that she has spoken up for the university.”

State Assemblywoman Deborah J. Glick, a Manhattan Democrat who is chairwoman of the Higher Education Committee, said Dr. Zimpher had not done enough to promote the individual strengths of some SUNY schools.

But over all, Ms. Glick said, Dr. Zimpher deserved much credit for raising SUNY’s reputation.”

Dr. Zimpher has served SUNY well in a state that historically has been very supportive of public higher education but since 2008 has followed a national trend of putting more of the financial burden of attending college on students and their families.

Tony