Police policy affects Trustee race dynamic
By Greg Berger, The Dartmouth Staff
Published on Friday, February 19, 2010
Strong opposition to the Hanover Police Department’s proposed alcohol compliance check policy has increased the visibility of Board of Trustees petition candidate Joe Asch ’79 among students, according to several students interviewed by The Dartmouth.
Asch and Alumni Council-nominated trustee candidate John Replogle ’88 — whom Asch is opposing in the race — both made statements against the compliance checks after Giaconne’s first announcement. Asch, however, also actively opposed the policy in posts on the Dartblog web site, to which he is a regular contributor, in addition to attending a Hanover Select Board meeting and speaking with students on the policy.
Both Replogle and Morton Kondracke ’60, the Alumni Council-nominated trustee candidate who is running unopposed for the second available seat, said they believe Asch is using Dartblog as a “campaign vehicle” in the trustee race.
Asch and Replogle both credited the increased readership among students to interest in learning more information about the Hanover Police policy.
Max Yoeli ’12, supporter of Asch’s Facebook page — “Joe Asch ’79 for Dartmouth Trustee” — said he is impressed by Asch’s close interactions with College students.
“The best description I have ever heard of [Asch] is he is a ‘Dartmouth patriot,’” Yoeli said.
Yoeli said that Asch’s outspokenness about the alcohol policy is “the only reason” he started to support Asch. Yoeli said he became familiar with Asch’s other campaign platforms after contacting Asch to discuss the alcohol policy.
Replogle said in an interview with The Dartmouth that students read Dartblog because they feel they have an “advocate” in Asch, adding that Asch’s commentary on the new alcohol policy “would have a populist appeal with students.”
Students do not have a vote in the upcoming elections for Board members.
In the six days following the announcement, Asch posted 13 comments about the issue on Dartblog — nine of which he published within one day of the announcement.
As of Feb. 11, Dartblog had seen a 75 percent increase in visitors to the site. Of those readers, 4,100 of 14,350 viewed the site using the Dartmouth network, Joe Malchow ’08, the web site’s founder, said in an e-mail to The Dartmouth.
“Alumni readers of Dartblog continued their reading patterns during the Giaccone imbroglio, while student readers increased their activity exponentially,” Malchow said.
An advertisement reading “Dartblog writer Joe Asch is running for trustee” appears at the top of the Dartblog web site, with a link to Asch’s campaign web site.
John Smith ’09, another supporter of Asch’s Facebook page, said he supports Asch’s trustee candidacy because of Asch’s “vocal” reporting on the alcohol policy. Support for Asch on Facebook jumped after Dartblog began reporting significantly on the alcohol policy.
“[Asch] has been my main source of information about the policy change,” Smith said. “It shows he really cares about the students and is in touch with the campus.”
Smith added that he supports Asch instead of other candidates because he is not familiar with the other candidates’ opinions on the issue.
Asch was one of four guest speakers — and the only trustee candidate — invited to speak at a forum organized by the Dartmouth Political Union last week to discuss the alcohol policy, according to DPU president Nathan Bruschi ’10. Asch and acting Head of Safety and Security Keiselim Montas were the only invitees who attended the meeting.
Bruschi said Asch was invited to the meeting because he was a trustee candidate who had taken a “bold stance” in opposition of the alcohol policy.
Jason Goodman ’12 said he does not believe students should be involved in the trustee election because it is more the business “of administrators and alumni.”
“It doesn’t really make sense to be involving students to the extent Joe Asch is,” he said.
Asch said he has always been an active commentator about the College, however.
“I have been writing about Dartmouth College issues for almost 10 years now and I think people read my materials because what I write is relevant to them and important to the life of the College, and if that is a campaign vehicle then so be it,” Asch said.
Asch has been criticized for not fully understanding the specific role of a member of the Board by Kondracke, Repologle and other alumni.
“I respect [Asch’s] intense interest in the College and I read his blogs, but the role of a trustee is to be a policymaker, and I fear [Asch] has a tendency to be a micro-manager,” Kondracke said previously in an e-mail to The Dartmouth. “[Asch] is a provocative blogger; [Replogle] will be a productive trustee.”
Of 41 students surveyed by The Dartmouth, six said they follow the trustee race. Fourteen students said they had heard of Asch, four had heard of Replogle and two had heard of Kondracke. Kondracke also made a statement denouncing the policy.
By press time, of 88 the 155 “fans” of Asch’s Facebook page were current Dartmouth undergraduates. Repogle’s Facebook page has 147 supporters, one of whom is an undergraduate student. The page supporting Kondracke’s candidacy for the Board has 66 members, one of whom is a College student.
On Feb. 10, Hanover Police Chief Nicholas Giaccone announced that Hanover Police would indefinitely delay its implementation of the compliance checks, made public Feb. 4.
Kondracke says, “I fear [Asch] has a tendency to be a micro-manager.”???
What is the basis for his fear? That Asch knows too much about Dartmouth? Kondracke should justify himself here. Too many of the comments in the D are not backed up by any evidence at all.
Want some evidence to the contrary: Asch’s bio says that he was a management consultant at Bain, well known as a strategy boutique.
By Truth Be Told on Feb 19 | 10:56 am
It is frightening that any time one of the petition trustees, and now a candidate, takes the time to understand the details of any College issue at more than a superficial level, they are accused of micro-management. How can the trustee majority credibly offset criticisms of being a rubber stamp without such committed inspections?
Being actively aware of challenges is not the same as doing management’s job, but it is essential to insure that the job gets done. Such awareness requires independent observation and doing more than passively accepting dog-and-pony show presentations at quarterly meetings.
Mort is concerned that Joe is overly involved. My concern is that Mort will follow past examples of an opposite nature. Why is does the Board find itself facing not merely a revenue shortfall, but worse, apparent surprise that the budget problems are structural and that the need for extensive reorganization is real? How do they know that similar challenges do not lie below the surface in curriculum or in student affairs, which are harder to quantify?
By Timothy A. Dreisbach 71 on Feb 19 | 11:03 pm
Asch (along with Dreisbach, above) has vocally supported several private lawsuits against the College, all of which, so far, have thankfully failed. Let’s not make the mistake of electing another unscrupulous alumnus who would rather waste the College’s resources on frivolous lawsuits than focus on solving problems. Asch hasn’t even donated to the College, even though he’s member of the class of 1979, which has high percentages of alumni giving. I barely make enough to pay rent, and yet even I can scrounge up enough to send my alma mater a few bucks every year, even if it doesn’t always listen to me every time I yell at it on my blog.
By Alumnus on Feb 21 | 9:23 pm
Tim, a little detective work (actually, a brief glance at http://www.dartmouth.edu/~alfund/thankyou/2009/1971.html) shows that you did not donate to the College last year. And yet you feel that you have some insight to offer in terms of its financial difficulties? I’ll grant you that: you’re part of the problem. Perhaps if you actually participated in College affairs in a way other than private litigation and the discouragement of financial support, you might not have been resoundingly defeated in the last AoA elections. The College needs a lot more than your hot air.
By Aaron J. Schlosser ‘07 on Feb 21 | 9:44 pm
Asch is just out for himself. His record clearly shows he attacks without provocation and reports on what serves his own best interest. Check into Asch’s complete record before deciding how good a trustee he would be
By Anonymous on Feb 21 | 10:09 pm
Huh? Lots of mud-slinging about Joe Asch. I don’t know the guy, but I’ll admit that I have enjoyed his opinions in the D these last few years. And, if I recall, didn’t he personally support the writing program AT THE COLLEGE a couple years back to the tune of thousands of his own dollars?
And I donate every year so don’t even bother looking up my name. If that’s the best “argument” that can be made against fellow alumni, someone needs to go back to school. What is this, “pay to play?” or “pay to say?”
By John S. Leyba 01 on Feb 22 | 2:50 am
Mr. Schlosser: A little more detective work would have shown that I have been a long-time donor to the College, even serving as Head Agent for my class. My donations will resume when the Alumni Relations office understands its role is to represent alumni, all alumni, to the College and not just to communicate administrative messages outward in dictatorial fashion, in order to manipulate alumni opinion. My volunteering of time was also substantial, and may resume once my alumni brethren demonstrate more willingness to consider ideas that make them uncomfortable.
For the record, I supported the first lawsuit, but after the change of AoA administrations, did not support the second one. Next time you espouse, have your facts straight and more complete. Rather than the personal attacks (including the one on micro-management lobbed in by Mr. Kondrake), how about more substantive comments?
Your anonymous friend will find that Asch’s financial contributions have been in the many hundreds of thousands of dollars.
By Timothy A. Dreisbach 71 on Feb 22 | 8:35 am
I suppose that the difference between you and me is that I view my financial support of the College as an ethical obligation and you view yours as a form of control. I feel that I will always owe the College for the opportunities with which it provided me; you feel that the College will always owe you for not always acting according to your personal wishes. Look up ‘donation’ in the dictionary: you’ll find that it’s an act of giving, not bribery.
By Aaron J. Schlosser ‘07 on Feb 22 | 12:36 pm
Aaron: I respect your altruism. Your comments about how I feel have no basis in fact and are wrong. Now how about if we stop wasting everyone else’s time?
By Timothy A. Dreisbach 71 on Feb 22 | 8:04 pm