Following the recent hiring of George Hynd as the new interim president for Winthrop, the board of trustees had a meeting to finalize his contract.
The meeting was held on Feb. 18 and only lasted about 30 minutes. Some of the trustees were not physically present and held a conference call. Only two trustees were present as well as the student representative, Imani Belton, and faculty representative, Dr. Adolphus Belk.
A few minutes after the call to order by Chairman Glenn McCall, the executive session began.
The board discussed approving the employment contract for South Carolina for the university president as well as the contract of supplement from the Winthrop University foundation. All members approved the supplement from the foundation and the employment contract in a public vote. The meeting for approving the contract only lasted about three minutes before it was adjourned.
Belk and Belton were not allowed in the executive meeting to look over the contract and were not given the contracts until the day of the meeting. When it comes to personnel matters with the contract the two representatives are not allowed to have input besides the executive board itself.
“I found out that the meeting was happening yesterday, so I had no input. I think legally I wasn’t allowed to have any input,” Belton said. “This is my first time seeing it so I will be reviewing it to see…if I… have any concerns. I will be reaching out to the chairs to get clarification. If there is anything that would need to be omitted it would have to come from the board itself.”
McCall signed the employment contract on Feb. 14, which was five days before the actual meeting was held while Hynd signed it on Feb. 21.
Hynd’s supplement contract is from Winthrop University’s non-profit foundation and a letter from Robert H. Breakfield, Winthrop’s foundation president, with both parties’ signatures.
In the letter Breakfield wrote, “I am pleased to extend an offer for supplemental compensation from the Winthrop University Foundation based on our anticipation of your performance in the development and fundraising for the University … the Winthrop University Foundation offers the following supplemental funding to your state-based salary and benefits.”
The benefits in this contract includes a monthly salary supplement of $11,501.75, a retirement benefit of 9.55 percent of the salary supplement and an advancement fund of $20,833 that can be used for discretionary spending.
Along with this, The Agency Head Salary Commission rules state that agency heads can receive a pay band of minimum salary of $183,313, a midpoint of $232,927 and a maximum of $284,171. The Agency Head Salary Commission rules state that an interim president can only receive the minimum of this pay band.
The next board meeting will be held in March and will go over minor details about Hynd’s process of moving to Winthrop.
“[The future meeting will be about the] onboarding process and making sure contracts have been signed and that is everything is done right,” Belton said. “As far as Dr. Mahony moving out of the house and [Hynd] moving into the house. There will be a lot of those small minor details about this process now.”
Editor’s note: This article has been edited to reflect corrections. A previous version of the story stated that the board of trustees approved Dr. George Hynd’s contract during executive session and had one opposing vote. The board met in executive session prior to the vote, however the approval of the contract was unanimously voted on publically. The article stated that five members were physically present, but only two were. Additionally, the Agency Head Salary Commission states that an interim president can receive only the minimum salary and the board does not set this amount.
Photo: Savannah Scott/ The Johnsonian
