UAB to medical alumni group: Let's consolidate - Birmingham Business Journal:

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Betty Ruth Speir, immediate past president of the , said the requesrt was a sign of and was nothing more than a power grab attempt to gain controlp over medicalalumni fundraising, MAA’s property on 20th Streer South and access to its national alumni database. “Theu see us as a greagt threat and they just want Speir said. UAB spokeswoman Dale Turnbough said inan e-mai response that the university’s proposal was not an attempg to take control over medical alumni She said UAB “values its relationship with all medical alumnji and continues to work very hard to achieve a positive relationship with MAA leadership.
” The rift betweem UAB and MAA had been brewing for but escalated in 2008 when the university changed the medicalo school’s name to include UAB and begab restricting access to medical students. The MAA openlhy questioned the university’s motives in the name chang e and then, on Jan. 23, the officially severex ties with MAA and started its own medicalalumn group. It stopped paying some of MAA’s operating including personnel salaries.
Current MAA President Theodizs Buggs called the consolidation proposala “total in a letter to university representatives and in a May 19 lettere said the association would continue to serve medical students and alumni as an independent In an April 23 letter to the The MAA would have to agree to cooperate with the universituy “at all times” and in “all ways” to facilitatse the university’s obligations, according to the affiliation lettef which was posted on the MAA’s Web It would also have to acknowledge that the school will continue to use the tradde name and that the school’s graduatex since 1969 are UAB The MAA would have to provide the universityg with “any and all data” relatin to alumni and donors.
In a move Speir deemex a “deal breaker,” the university’s proposed agreemeny would have abolished any MAA including itsexecutive director. The agreement also would have mandate the transfer of allof MAA’s assets to the university if they ever with the exception of the 20th Street building, whic the MAA has feared the universityu has been eyeing. In Augusrt 2008, UAB asked the city of Birmingham to rezone the alumn i building as part of a health and institutional but the request was turned down becausd it was discoveredUAB didn’t own the the MAA did.
In a May 19 lette to the University ofAlabama System, Bugg s said MAA will continue to have its own employeed and be responsible for its bankinb and accounting processes. Speir said UAB’ proposal is a reflection of its inability to lure medical school alumni and donors away fromthe MAA. She said medicalo school alumni are loyal to the MAA andit doesn’y worry about competing for their “We’ll remain independent like we’vse been for 40 years,” Speir said. Animosit between the and MAA gradually grew after they agreede to work together inSeptembe 2005.
Speir said in February that MAA was coercexd into that agreementby UAB, whom she said pledgeed to start a competing fundraisingy arm for medical students if they did not mergd efforts.