Missouri to start new president search after candidate rejects offer

COLUMBIA, Mo. -- Stung by the rejection of a job offer to its top candidate, University of Missouri curators plan to start a new search for the system's next president.

"The committee is going to start a completely new search," board chairman Don Walsworth said Friday afternoon following a two-hour closed meeting.

Walsworth confirmed that curators made an offer to an undisclosed candidate who rejected the job Wednesday "to accept another employment opportunity in the private sector."

He declined to identify that individual, citing confidentiality. But a source familiar with the offer identified the candidate as Terry Sutter, 49, a New Jersey business executive and graduate of the Columbia campus. The source is a close confidant of Sutter who requested anonymity because of the confidential nature of Missouri's search.

Walsworth also said that U.S. Rep. Kenny Hulshof -- the only one of three finalists to publicly acknowledge interest in the job -- is no longer a candidate to succeed Elson Floyd, who left Missouri in April to become president of Washington State University.

"He is not a candidate as far as I know," Walsworth said. "We're starting a fresh list."

In response, Hulshof issued a written statement expressing his disappointment in the curators' decision.

"Let me be clear -- I did not withdraw my name from consideration," said Hulshof, a sixth-term Republican and University of Missouri-Columbia graduate. "This is the decision of chairman Walsworth and the board."

Walsworth said the university entered negotiations with its top candidate over the Memorial Day weekend after reviewing comments from a 19-member advisory panel, a group of professors, students, alumni, retirees and non-faculty employees from the Kansas City, St. Louis, Columbia and Rolla campuses.

Curators are scheduled to next meet in Marceline in late July, although they have regularly convened by telephone conference calls to discuss the search process. Walsworth said the board still hopes to have a new president in place before the fall semester.

Walsworth said the board strongly supports interim president Gordon Lamb, a former president of Northeastern Illinois University in Chicago and acting chancellor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

Sutter, who did not return telephone calls to his home Friday seeking comment, is a former president of Tyco Plastics & Adhesives who was replaced after a 2006 takeover of the company.

He graduated from the Columbia campus in 1984 with a bachelor's degree in chemical engineering.

Sutter previously spent two years as president of Cytec Industries' specialty chemical division and was also president of industry solutions for Honeywell/Allied Signal.

His rejection threw a major wrench into the search process. Curators arrived Wednesday night in Columbia for the start of their regularly scheduled two-day meeting hoping to announce their selection.

Instead, they interrupted that meeting Thursday for a previously unannounced closed session. They met a second time behind closed doors Friday afternoon, just before Walsworth's announcement.