Deans to take college helm

BINGHAMTON — John W. Deans soon will add Broome Community College president to a resume that includes mayor, citizenship award winner and longtime chief executive of a Northern New York college.

BCC trustees Thursday expect to name Mr. Deans, 65, to a six-month post as Broome's interim president, board of trustees Chairman Robert Moppert said.

"He comes highly recommended, and is a guy everyone seems to respect," Mr. Moppert said. "A bunch of us already knew him."

Mr. Deans was president of Jefferson Community College in Watertown from 1992 through his retirement in 2002, then returned four years later to be JCC's interim leader.

Mr. Deans will succeed Daniel Hayes, who will step down Tuesday after a year as BCC's interim chief. Mr. Hayes, the retired Finger Lakes Community College president who was appointed last summer after Laurence D. Spraggs retired with a year left on his $150,000-a-year contract, has said he wants to spend more time with his family.

Officials in the state university system recommended Mr. Deans to BCC as someone who could lead the school while BCC's sometimes-tumultuous search continues for a permanent successor to Mr. Spraggs.

Mr. Deans earned a doctorate from the University at Albany. He turned down a teaching job at a Rochester-area high school in 1967 to hire on as a history and political science instructor at JCC, then rose through the ranks before assuming the $110,000-a-year president's job.

"My goal for Broome is pretty simple," he said. "Work with the team that's in place to keep them moving forward. Hopefully, I can enter on a quiet note."

His salary at Broome will be based on the $135,000 per year that Mr. Hayes was paid, Mr. Moppert said. Mr. Deans also will receive housing and car allowances.

Mr. Moppert said Broome trustees were impressed by Mr. Deans's success in serving students from Fort Drum.

BCC trustees must approve the appointment to make it official. They'll meet Thursday night.

Trustees this spring could not agree on any of the four candidates an Arizona-based search firm had recommended to succeed Mr. Spraggs, who had begun job-hunting after a public split with Broome County Executive Barbara J. Fiala over whether the county should help fund a communications school at BCC. After being unable to choose a president, trustees dismissed the firm, hired The Association of Community College Trustees to continue the search, and committed up to $50,000 to the effort.

At Jefferson Community College, Mr. Deans is credited with launching the school's distance-learning program, leading an $11.8 million building project and conducting a $2.1 million capital campaign. In 1999, the Greater Watertown Chamber of Commerce awarded him its Israel A. Shapiro Citizenship Award for his achievement, leadership and contributions to the region.

After retiring, he won election as mayor of the village of Sackets Harbor. He later spent 11 months as JCC's interim president.