Tag Archives: college of veterinary medicine

education news

Vet school set to become a reality for the Panhandle

I want to offer some hand claps to Amarillo and the Texas Panhandle for a signature they have obtained from Gov. Greg Abbott.

The governor has signed legislation that grants state money to build a school of veterinary medicine in Amarillo. It will be the second such institution in Texas. It will be operated by Texas Tech University and it will be located wholly in Amarillo, which lobbied furiously for the funds to build this much-needed project.

I had the pleasure of visiting with former Texas Tech Chancellor Bob Duncan not long before he got the bum’s rush by the Tech board of regents. Duncan came to Amarillo to make the case for the vet school and to tell the community that the state needed the second such program. Texas A&M University operates the long-standing school of veterinary medicine and had resisted Tech’s efforts to gain legislative approval for the new school.

This is a big deal, man! I am delighted that the region’s legislative delegation — state Sen. Kel Seliger and state Reps. John Smithee and Four Price, all Amarillo Republicans — flexed its collective muscle to ensure this legislative victory.

It also is heartening that Texas Tech, despite Duncan’s ouster as chancellor, managed to maintain its own momentum with a new chancellor, Tedd Mitchell, at the helm.

The Amarillo campus will enable Panhandle veterinary students to stay closer to home to get their education. One can hope, too, that they will remain at home to pursue their careers as doctors of veterinary medicine.

I had my share of anxious moments while living in the Panhandle and even after moving away. But then Amarillo’s economic development gurus lined up behind the project; so did the City Council; civic and business leaders ponied up serious money to help lighten the public burden.

I understand the vet school will open for class in a couple of years. Students will receive a first-class education that will pave the way for first-class careers.

It is nice to see the Texas Panhandle, which occasionally gets the short shrift from those in power way down yonder in Austin, score a major victory.

local news

Texas Tech regents headed for a big shakeup?

Might it be that a former Amarillo mayor, Jerry Hodge, managed to exert enough pressure on the chairman of the Texas Tech University Board of Regents to surrender his chairmanship?

Hodge is angry at the Tech board over the way it handled the ouster — and let’s call it what it was — of former Tech Chancellor Bob Duncan. Frankly, I’m angry, too. So are a lot of Tech partisans throughout the state and beyond.

Hodge launched an effort to get rid of former Tech Regents Chairman Rick Francis, on whose watch the board conducted what it called an “informal vote” in executive, or secret, session. The informal vote said regents no longer had confidence in Duncan’s leadership as chancellor.

Duncan then announced his retirement … and was gone!

To their credit, regents have approved more money for an upcoming college of veterinary medicine that Tech wants to build in Amarillo.

Francis remains on the Tech board. He’s just no longer the chairman. I hope Gov. Greg Abbott chooses not to reappoint him. I believe — and this is just my view only, as someone who didn’t attend Tech, but who got to know Duncan over the years — that Francis and four of the nine regents disserved the university with their no-confidence vote.

What’s more, they well might have acted illegally. That issue needs examination, too. Regents said they had their informal vote in closed session. I’ve always understood that the Texas Open Meetings Law prohibits secret votes. Regents or any governing body aren’t allowed to vote in executive session; they’re supposed to cast those votes in the open.

I don’t know what the appropriate sanction ought to be. Perhaps a public letter of reprimand from the governor’s office might suffice.

At least the chairmanship has been handed over to someone else. If the former Amarillo mayor had a hand in that happening, then I applaud him.

business news, local news, State news

Texas Tech announces vet school plan for Amarillo

animals2

When he was chancellor of the Texas Tech University System, Kent Hance ventured to Amarillo and made a fascinating pronouncement.

Amarillo, he said, is ready to support a full-fledged medical school campus, rather than a campus for upperclassmen and women — as it does now.

It would require community support to make it happen, Hance said. He went back to Texas Tech’s “mother ship campus” in Lubbock and the subject has been pretty much dormant ever since.

Then this happened today: The current chancellor, Bob Duncan, ventured north to Amarillo and announced concrete plans to develop a college of veterinary medicine right here.

OK, so Texas Tech isn’t yet announcing a plan for an expanded health sciences operation here, but the veterinary school announcement is pretty darn big.

Reports have been circulating for the past few days. Texas Tech is aiming to serve a significant audience by bringing such an academic institution to Amarillo. The city sits in the heart of some of the richest agricultural land in the nation. Rural residents own lots of animals — large and small — that need medical attention.

The veterinary school would be poised to train “animal doctors” to care for these patients.

Chancellor Duncan has made a significant pledge to the Amarillo region with today’s announcement and has pledged to deepen Texas Tech University’s footprint in the Panhandle, which by itself is going to bring a major economic development boost to the region.