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NCCC President will remain in position despite cloud of bid-rigging scandal

Posted at 8:33 PM, Mar 02, 2017
and last updated 2017-03-03 00:08:19-05

Niagara County Community College President James Klyczek will stay in power -- for the time being -- after college Trustees voted down a measure, five to four, that would have put him on suspension.

Klyczek, the longest-serving president in NCCC history, remains chief executive despite an FBI investigation and an ongoing internal probe that was prompted by a 7 Eyewitness News investigation into bid-rigging at the Niagara Falls Culinary Institute.

In emails obtained exclusively last week by 7 Eyewitness News, Klyczek in 2010 appeared to favor companies with ties to college officials to receive millions of dollars of public contracts for the construction of the Niagara Falls Culinary Institute.

Additional emails also suggested that Klyczek may have deceived state officials about the $30 million project, mocked elderly trustees and made a series of lewd remarks about college officials.

The meeting marked the third special session in less than two weeks for the board, which hired a public relations firm and outside legal counsel to grapple with the fallout of the scandal while beginning an internal investigation.

Federal investigators issued a subpoena to the college just before last Tuesday’s special meeting “for documents and information related [to] the awarding of those contracts."

Klyczek joined NCCC in 2001 and was appointed to the presidency in 2002