An NC State professor called for a vote of no confidence in Chancellor Randy Woodson, Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Warwick Arden and Dean of the College of Education Paola Sztajn over what he said was a “mishandling of the contamination of Poe Hall and the cancer cluster.”
WRAL first reported that Stephen Porter, professor of Higher Education, called for the vote in an email addressed to the Chair of the College of Education faculty Cameron Denson.
Denson told Technician in an email Thursday that the emergency faculty business meeting to address the call for a vote of no confidence will be Friday, Feb. 9, at noon. The meeting is not open to the public.
Mick Kulikowski, University spokesperson, told Technician that NC State doesn’t have a comment on the matter at the moment.
In his email to the Chair of the College of Education faculty, Porter wrote he hopes a vote of no confidence will compel the University to be more transparent, provide resources for those with health concerns and “allow the federal government to investigate the cancer cluster in Poe Hall.”
WRAL reported Monday that NC State asked a federal agency to stop evaluating Poe Hall after PCBs, a chemical linked to cancer, were found in the building.
At a Faculty Senate meeting Tuesday, Arden said the University has never refused to cooperate with a federal investigation. WRAL told Technician that NC State has not asked WRAL to make any changes or updates to its reporting published Monday.
Porter said he thinks the University will respond to the vote with more information about Poe Hall.
“I would not be surprised that news of this impending no-confidence vote will cause the University to reveal the full testing results for Poe Hall, information that I believe they have been sitting on for several weeks,” Porter wrote in the email.
Arden said Tuesday that the University isn’t withholding new information about Poe Hall, and it expects new environmental testing results within the next week or so.
This story was updated Feb. 8 at 11:48 a.m. to replace Denson’s previous comment that he was in the process of scheduling an emergency faculty meeting with the official meeting time and date.
