Second in a series
Re “Danger Signs at PCC? Not for Rocha, Says Rocha”
[img]1769|right|Dr. Mark Rocha||no_popup[/img]Dateline Pasadena – The first person to speak at a gathering of decidedly unhappy present and former employees of Pasadena City College said that “it is nearly impossible” to know when President Mark Rocha, battling months of no-confidence votes, “is telling the truth.
“Dr. Rocha is the highest paid of 112 community college presidents, and he may be the worst of them.
“He claims he has not received any raises in three years. That is not true. Raises are written into his contract. He made sure of that just as he has taken control of every facet of the college. Shared governance here is a thing of the past.”
The loudest voices at Pasadena City College would love to find a mechanism to rid the campus of the dreaded 60-year-old Dr. Rocha, presumably headed for the twilight days of his career. They are not even close, though, to finding one.
He has three years remaining on his hermetically sealed contract, and no one connected with PCC – including the supposedly sycophantic Board of Trustees – has the authority to remove him, numerous critics agree.
“Let me give you an example of the kind of shameless autocrat Rocha has been,” said a longtime former faculty member. “He changed the way that his job performance is reviewed. In the past, faculty and others participated in the review process. Now, only he is part of the review process.”
Dr. Rocha did not manipulate this rule unilaterally, said another.
“The Trustees, who go along with everything he does or wants, needed to sign off on this, and they did.
“When it came time for his review, only he and the Board of Trustees were involved. And they seem to do what he tells them.”
(To be continued)
