NJ Public Colleges Comply with Executive Order

New York, NY —

New Jersey's public colleges are scrambling to see if members on their Board of Trustees have a potential conflicts of interest now illegal under executive order. Acting New Jersey Governor Richard Codey has forbidden trustees from doing private business with the same college they are helping run. WNYC's Bob Hennelly has more.

Under the terms of Codey's Executive Order, every member of the board of trustees at the state's 31 colleges and universities is prohibited from serving while they have a business relationship with that same institution. The sweeping order covers immediate family members of the trustees and even extends to college Presidents and their families.

Officials covered under the order have 30 days to either resign from their college post or terminate their business relationship. The move comes after a series of investigative reports by the Newark Star Ledger found five of the nine board members overseeing the state's University of Medicine and Dentistry had potential conflicts.

UMDNJ is now the target of both an ongoing state and federal criminal probe into its' Medicaid billing practices and multi-million dollar contracts awarded to politically connected firms and individuals.