Nov. 6 – Three moderate candidates for the North Idaho College Board of Trustees defeat their Republican Party-backed opponents in Tuesday’s elections, shifting control of the embattled board as the college waits to hear whether it will seek accreditation next year retain.
After all precincts were counted Wednesday morning, Rick Durbin defeated William Lyons 52% to 48%.
Eve Knudtsen won by the largest margin, defeating the only incumbent president, Greg McKenzie, with 56% of the vote.
Mary Havercroft defeated Michael Angilletta with 51%.
Durbin, Knudtsen and Havercroft will join Brad Corkill and Tarie Zimmerman on the five-member board. All five were supported by the activist organization Save NIC, which has advocated for responsible governance amid the university’s years-long accreditation crisis, which was largely the result of governance dysfunction.
North Idaho Republicans, another organization of moderate conservatives that has opposed the Kootenai County Republican Central Committee’s influence on nonpartisan races, had also endorsed the winning candidates.
Knudtsen said she is “overjoyed” and that it is time for the board to chart a new course. She said the new board can demonstrate to the college’s accreditor its sustained commitment to meeting all accreditation requirements.
“We have a lot of work to do, especially in the next two months,” Knudtsen said.
Brent Regan, chairman of the KCRCC, posted on the social media platform
“I wish the new NIC Trustee all the best and look forward to North Idaho College continuing its current upward trajectory,” Regan wrote.
The next board meeting is November 20.
James Hanlon’s reporting for The Spokesman-Review is funded in part by Report for America and by members of the Spokane community. This story can be republished for free by other organizations under a Creative Commons license. For more information about this, please contact the editor-in-chief of our newspaper.
