James Call
The President of Florida State University doesn’t like the idea of guns on campus. Ten days after John Thrasher became president in November a gunman shot three students at the school library. One student paralyzed in the shooting is expected to resume engineering studies soon.
A proposal by Rep. Greg Steube is moving through the Florida Legislature would allow students to carry guns and concealed weapons on campuses. Steube said the measure would make campuses safer by allowing armed law-abiding citizens to intervene.
Thrasher thinks it’s a bad idea.
“I am absolutely opposed to it. And I will continue to oppose it,” Thrasher told the Capitol City Tiger Bay Club Wednesday. “For personal and policy reasons; I don’t believe guns on campus is a right kind of environment and I know many of our friends at the legislature have different views about that. And I hope they will seriously consider what’s best when they go into that issue.”
Thrasher spent 22 minutes laying out FSU’s 2015 legislative agenda and spreading the good news about the university; top-ranked law, business and film schools and high-achieving students campus wide.
Tiger Bay is famous for its irreverent, witty sarcastic putdowns of guests and takes on the news but the jokes were light for the Thrasher appearance.
A group of students were outside protesting their president’s refusal to meet with them about the Koch Foundation’s relationship with the university’s economic department. Tiger Bay President Steve Birtman wished them a “coke and a smile.”
Charlie Barnes introduced Thrasher but first invited any New York Times reporter to the front better to “get the full story and not the Brian Williams version.”
And Thrasher mentioned that he thought he would have ditched the Capitol Press Corp when he left the Capitol for academia but then he spotted the dean of the press corps, Bill Cotterell, and congratulated him on a mediocre career.
As Thrasher noted, he hadn’t attended any of the club’s luncheons since he was Speaker of the Florida House in 2000. His attempt at humor, a riff on white men being unable to jump, in the wake of Sen. Kendrick Meek’s sit-in at Governor’s Bush office, ignited a firestorm of protests.
“I remember how enjoyable that was,” Thrasher chuckled. Apparently so did a large number of club members, who joined in on the laughter.
That is about how irreverent the meeting got. Fifteen years later, Thrasher is no longer a politician, but the school’s president and he didn’t even have to leave campus to speak to Tiger Bay – it holds its meetings at the university’s Donald L. Tucker Center.
t was a hometown crowd of alumni and supporters who appeared to accept Thrasher’s agenda for their school. In addition to opposing a gun on campus initiative FSU will seek money to raise faculty salaries, hire more faculty and resources to break into a top-25 academic status. Thrasher said the school will seek $30 million in pre-eminent funding; the school had received about $35 million total in the past two years.
“We are not going to ask for an increase in tuition,” said Thrasher. “I frankly think it ought to be the last resort to raise tuition on the back of our kids. We can ask the legislature and I think they’ll respond to the needs we have at this university.”
Thrasher addressed the Koch Foundation controversy saying faculty assured him the agreement does not infringe on academic freedom and that it was time to move on.
