TERCERO OK'D $100,000s IN CHECKS WITH RUBBER-STAMPED SIGNATURES OF TRUSTEES NO LONGER ON THE BOARD

By Juan Montoya
On May 18, 2016, Kiko Rendon was replaced by local attorney Ruben Herrera as a trustee on the board of Texas Southmost College.
Then, after a runoff, Dr. Tony Zavaleta replaced Ed Rivera as a member of the board on June 27.
In the interim, Trey Mendez had been acting chairman, a role he held until at that same meeting trustee Adela Garza was voted as the new chairman by the new board.

Yet, even after Rendon had left the board in May and was no longer an official at the college, TSC President Lily Tercero continued to use the rubber stamp of his signature to approve payments to students, vendors and other governmental entities. These payments bearing Rendon's stamped signature continued until late in July, more than two months after he left office.

This was despite the fact that she had at her disposal the stamped signature of trustee Adela Garza from her previous stint as board vice chair.
An informational request by El Rrun-Rrun to TSC yielded more than 600 check facsimiles that indicate that payments totaling $100,000s had been approved by Tercero bearing the rubber stamped signatures of Rivera as well as Kiko Rendon's. The documentation fills reams of pages of copied checks. (See graphic below. Click to enlarge.)


Rivera was replaced on the board by Zavaleta on June 27. Yet, his rubber-stamped signature continued to appear – and were approved for payment by Tercero – late into July.

Both these former trustees had decided not to run for reelection. During their tenure there, they were know as literal "rubber stamps" for the policies implemented by Tercero and her full-time consultant (and former boss) Leonardo de la Garza, which they continued paying at a rate of $180,000 a year. TSC was paying, in effect, for two full-time presidents.


For this, Rendon and Rivera were heavily criticized in the community, but both shrugged it off and continued giving Tercero and de la Garza what they wanted and followed their policy directives instead of the other way around.


Along with her June 19 cover letter to Northeast Lakeview College when she is applying for the president's position, there is a description of Tercero as "the former president of Texas Southmost College (2011-2016) (who) oversaw the official separation of the college from UT Brownsville authority to independent, fully comprehensive, and separately accredited community college status."

She did not mention that – with the acquiescence of River and Rendon – it had taken three years for TSC to gain separate accreditation, had a nursing program with a death verdict by the state regulatory agencies, and has been separated from her duties by the new board.

And we're sure that the Northeast Lakeview College people don't know that there is a probe into her extension of a $1 million-plus windstorm insurance contract that she signed off on without getting the approval of the TSC board.
The dismissal hearing into her contract is scheduled for September 19.

Her defenders – including "composite" letter-writer Italo Zarate and trustee Dr. Rey Garcia – have charged that Tercero was "wronged" by the new board. But in light of the facts revolving around the windstorm insurance, the endangered nursing program, and now the $100,000s in checks approved with her use of the rubber stamp bearing the names of trustees who are no longer on the board, that defense fall woefully short of justifying her remaining as head of TSC.