“Everyone’s on board again,” the president of New College of Florida said Wednesday, apparently referring to a renewed attempt to take over the neighboring Sarasota-Manatee campus of the University of South Florida.
That proposed deal never materialized this year, despite internal documents that showed USF had drafted the legislation and New College prepared press releases to announce the decision as early as February, as part of its effort to expand its student body and campus footprint.
On Thursday, USF denied that any high-level talks with New College were underway.
“No bills were filed during last year’s legislative session and since that time USF leadership has not been engaged in discussions with New College of Florida about expanding our partnership,” USF spokeswoman Althea Johnson said in a statement.
“USF is proud to be the only preeminent state university and Association of American Universities member located in the Sarasota-Manatee region and we look forward to continuing to serve the area.”
Johnson also pointed to the approval this month of a “$6.5 million project to build a new STEM academic facility on the Sarasota-Manatee campus, providing new lab space for students and faculty,” as evidence of USF’s commitment to the Sarasota-Manatee campus.
The takeover issue came up Wednesday, when New College president Richard Corcoran said he still wants more dormitory space at USF Sarasota-Manatee, and signaled he would try again to strike some kind of deal, the specifics of which were unclear.
"If we can work out and finalize the deal with the legislature, it was pretty much done. USF had signed off on it. We had signed off on it. The governor had signed off on it,” Corcoran said at a board of trustees meeting.
“The legislature is, like we talked about last night at the master plan. It's, you know, making sausage. Go figure. But everyone's on board again," Corcoran said.
The deal that was being considered this winter would have given the entire USF Sarasota-Manatee campus, and its new dorms, to neighboring New College in exchange for wiping out $53 million in debt for USF.
But alumni, students, and local business leaders with strong ties to USF spoke out against the idea and the transfer never materialized.
In June, some USF campus board members said if any merger were to take place, USF should take the lead, and USF President Rhea Law expressed her gratitude to those “willing to fight with us.”
Just over two years ago, New College’s board of trustees was taken over by allies of Governor Ron DeSantis, in a bid to remake the honors college into a southern version of the private Hillsdale College in Michigan, which focuses on conservative ideals and what it calls “classical education.”
Part of New College’s transformation has involved expanding its athletics offerings, including baseball, lacrosse and soccer.
But plans to construct new fields have run into regulatory hurdles from the Federal Aviation Administration, because the new sports fields would largely be on land the college leases from Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport.
READ MORE: New College's 'field of dreams' hung up by lack of FAA approvals
A million-dollar project to build a baseball field called the Beruff Family Field of Dreams has stalled because it would be partly on land owned by New College, and partly on land it leases from the airport. It is already months behind schedule.
At Wednesday’s meeting Corcoran addressed the delays, and spoke of his hopes for the fiscal year that ends in June 2026.
"Hopefully we'll have the baseball field done,” Corcoran said, adding he is “very optimistic… given the great partnership that we have with the airport, that we'll have an airport deal done in this fiscal year."
Corcoran did not specify what kind of deal. A New College spokesman gave no further details, and airport CEO Rick Piccolo did not respond to requests for comment.
The FAA last year blocked the airport's attempt to sell 30 acres of its property to New College, saying it was not in the airport's best interest.
