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Alexa McQuistar, a graduate student at Northwest Missouri State University, walks out of the administration building on campus.

A proposal to rename the oldest building at Northwest Missouri State University after its retiring chief has fallen flat.

Student groups, alumni, faculty and Northwest Foundation representatives spoke in favor of renaming the campus’ administration building after Dr. Dean Hubbard at a January Board of Regents meeting. However, the motion to rename the building was tabled by a majority of the regents because, they said, one member, Doug Wyckoff, was not in attendance.

Regent Rita Hanks brought the issue up again at Wednesday’s board meeting, saying she was disappointed in the board’s action in January and that the renaming should be reconsidered.

“I thought that as a board we left the impression that personalities were involved,” Ms. Hanks said. “I hope that’s not what they thought.”

Anthony Mitten, a student senate representative who made the initial pitch to the board in January, told the News-Press after the meeting that he was disappointed by the decision but was fully prepared for it after January’s meeting. He said the concern among students is that some board members might have vendettas against Dr. Hubbard.

“A lot of the students feel it wasn’t a decision based on the actual substance of the administration building, but it was with personal agendas,” he said.

Regent Doug Sutton said those who opposed the renaming basically couldn’t back up their decision with scientific proof. Apparently, some correspondence indicated that it was against protocol to name an administration building after a person. Mr. Mitten offered later that many universities, including Truman State, had made such decisions.

When board president Bill Loch asked for more discussion on the issue, none of the regents who voted to table the issue in January spoke, except Gary Panethiere, who after a pause said “another item of unfinished business, if we’re moving on … ”

For the next hour, the board discussed an issue regarding Wind Capital Group’s proposal to put two windmills on the university farm before a student stood and asked the regents to publicly discuss the renaming issue.

Two of the members, Mr. Wyckoff and Rachelle Brown, said they felt the issue was unfairly placed on their shoulders. Mr. Wyckoff said, however, that his reason to vote against the renaming has nothing to do with Dr. Hubbard’s accomplishments.

“I have reservations about naming it after anybody,” he said, adding that he would have preferred that the board come up with a naming opportunity among themselves.

Ms. Brown said naming the administration building after Dr. Hubbard would be a disservice to past and future presidents.

“I want to hold this building as sacred,” she said. “To me, I view it as the White House. The White House remains the White House because we’re not going to attach any person’s name to it.”

Voting against the proposal were regents Mr. Loch, Mr. Wyckoff, Ms. Brown and Lydia Hurst

Voting for the proposal were Ms. Hanks, Mr. Sutton and Don Schneider. Mr. Panethiere abstained from voting.

Jimmy Myers can be reached at jimmym@npgco.com