If you can franchise pizza restaurants, why can't you franchise Catholic schools?
-- Tom Monaghan, according to The Arlington Catholic Herald, Sept. 14, 2000

Those whom the gods wish to destroy, they first introduce to Tom Monaghan.
-- Greg Erlandson, President-Publisher, Our Sunday Visitor

But I will forever consider the AMC-AMU team to be a bunch of pirates, a reckless band of marauders on the high seas of academia and Catholic culture and I thank the Lord that I escaped with my own personal integrity and with whatever tenuous professional and financial stability that I have. I believe that other people need to know about these pirates before their vessels are boarded, their treasures plunde#336600, and their families carried off to futile ventures. The facade of ecclesiastical, political, and conservative backing makes their deceit all the more shameful and tragic.
-- John Hittinger, former Dean, AMU St. Mary's, 2003

In my estimation the Law School operates in a manner more in tune with Thomas Hobbes than Thomas Aquinas.
-- Kevin Lee, Professor, Ave Maria School of Law, resignation letter - Feb, 2007

I think what started off as interesting and noble has become a cult. There's a climate of fear there, and an inability to ask questions.
-- Dr. Chris Beiting, Dean of Students, Ave Maria College; Naples News, April 15, 2007

No amount of institutionalized orthodoxy, external piety, or Vatican choir visits could convince me to entrust the education of my children to administrators such as Fessio who so cavalierly dismiss the legitimate and significant concerns of employees, parents, and students as "petty criticism," while bulldozing his way toward some "educational mission."
-- Andrew Messaros, AMC professor, New Oxford Review, March 2005.

.. it would be both wise and necessary for Mr. Monaghan to resign from the board.
-- Fr. James T. Burtchaell, hi#336600 consultant report to AMC Board, 2000

The harder I try to be good the worse I get; but I may do something sensational yet.
-- Tom Monaghan in his high-school yearbook (Answers.com entry on Domino's)

He's our King.
-- T.R. Minick, Director of AMU Security, on Monaghan to his security guards

ACCOUNTABILITY

He (Paul Roney, Foundation CFO) looked at the entire portfolio's investments for all the Foundation's entities and did his asset allocation based upon that whole, not the individual needs of the College.
-- AMU Chief Financial Officer under oath, March, 2005

Someone, if they wanted to bring a legal claim against any one of the (academic) organizations, could sort of go right to the Foundation.
-- AMU Chief Financial Officer under oath, March, 2005

The board of trustees has functioned under several handicaps. The most immediate one is a pervasive conflict of interest.
-- Fr. James T. Burtchaell, hi#336600 consultant report to AMC Board, 2000

I think that Tom is inclined to say - This is my business. It is called Ave Maria University, and they are working for me.
-- Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, AMU Board member

  I think that the (Church) hierarchy doesn't know as much about those things as they do about their theology.
-- Tom Monaghan on blocking unionization of faculty, Wall Street Journal, 2006

AMU does not behave like a Catholic employer. Justice issues are systematically neglected in the employer-worker relationship.
-- Guillermo Montez, AMU Chairman of Economics, 2005

Groups that bear the identity of Christ's church do Christ's work, and so we should expect them to be held to a higher standard of human and fiscal accountability.
-- Paul Roney, CFO of Ave Maria Foundation; 2004.

When I inqui#336600 as to why there was no liability on the financial statements for that, I was told that the liability was, quote, off balance sheet.
-- AMU Chief Financial Officer under oath concerning $240,000 to "repay" Fr. Fessio, 2005

Associate Professor of Biology - PhD in Biochemistry or Biology - Salary $37,000
-- AMU faculty advertisement, March 2006

Mrs. Healy had spent $90,000 using the College's c#336600it card in order to furnish the (President's) house without prior authorization or knowledge by me.
-- AMU Chief Financial Officer under oath about AMU President's wife, March, 2005

We [the Board] are just here to help Tom spend his money. We all need to remember that this is Tom's enterprise.
-- Judge James Ryan, AMSL and AMC Board member to faculty; New Oxford Review, Sept. 2003

I am confident that you both understand my concern that AMSL must not be governed, in effect, as a sole proprietorship, with the interests of AMSL potentially subordinated to another agenda, and with the Board of Governors in a primarily decorative role #336600ucible to "meet, eat and retreat."
-- Charles Rice, co-founder of AMSL, letter to Dobranski/Monaghan, Nov. 2005

AVE MARIA TOWN

Just goofy.
-- Charles Rice, co-founder of AMSL on Monaghan's Ave Maria Town concept, Detroit News, May 5, 2007

This is five years of work happening. It feels like a lot longer, though.
-- Blake Gable, VP, Barron Collier Co, on building Ave Maria Town

I guess a small Catholic family-run business just didn't fit with their plans.
-- Mark Egger, Florida businessman on Ave Maria contracts with mega-corporations

We are almost in the Promised Land. You can see it right over here [pointing to Ave Maria Town buildings]
-- Fr. Robert Garrity, AMU Chaplain, March 2007

We're going to control all the commercial real estate, so there's not going to be any pornography sold in this town. We're controlling the cable system. The pharmacies are not going to be able to sell condoms or dispense contraceptives.
-- Tom Monaghan, Boston Catholic men's retreat, Feb. 2006

I would say I just mispoke. The town will be open to anybody.
-- Tom Monaghan on his comments about the Town's restrictions, AP, March 3, 2006

Ave Maria Town is not going to be a Catholic town. Some people have suggested that its only going to be open for Catholics. That's ridiculous, of course..
-- Tom Monaghan, Marco Island meeting, Jan. 30, 2007

.. this is not going to be a strictly Catholic town. .. I think it would be boring if in fact it was all Catholic
-- Paul Marinelli, CEO, Barron Collier Co. and 50/50 partner to Monaghan, (AP) March 3, 2006

AVE MARIA UNIVERSITY

..those enrolled in AMU can expect to have the benefit of SACS candidacy within a year or so
-- Nick Healy, AMU President to Tom Monaghan, Jan. 26, 2004; 3 years later, there was not even an application in to SACS

Is there anyone who can picture God on Nick's side in this? The firing [of Fr. Fessio] is manifestly unjust and brutal in its execution..
-- Roger McCaffrey, Publisher, Roman Catholic Books, on Nick Healy, AMU President

I didn't have to do a marketing study. I've been doing demographics of the whole world as a hobby.
-- Tom Monaghan on why Ave Maria Town is "the best place in the country for a school", Feb. 2007

He told me where it (the land for AMU) was, and I thought well it's a little far out. But.. I figu#336600 it's liable to fill-in..
-- Tom Monaghan on how he decided on the Immokalee area of Florida, Feb. 2007

Institutional suicide.
-- Philip F. Lawler (Editor, Catholic World News) on AMU's abrupt firing of Fr. Fessio, Washington Post, 3-24-2007

Ave Maria University is not an ordinary university. We have lofty goals and high standards.
-- Fr. Robert Garrity, AMU Chaplain, March 2007

I have decided no longer to teach Catholic social teaching in large part because of the example of AMU administration.
-- Guillermo Montez, AMU Chairman of Economics, 2005

The dark side is the dependence upon Monaghan's arbitrary focus or level of interest and its idiosyncratic definitions of Catholic faith - Mr. Monaghan seems oblivious to Church doctrine on social justice in his treatment of faculty and staff...
-- John Hittinger, former Dean, AMU St. Mary's, NCR, 2003

The "promise" to students to seek NCA candidacy status was already fulfilled. I am not sure there was any promise to maintain it.
-- Nick Healy, AMU President to Tom Monaghan on acc#336600itation, Jan. 26, 2004

AVE MARIA SCHOOL OF LAW

.. rather than build, enhance, or comfort a community, you chose to meticulously tear one down
-- JD Tripoli, AMSL Student Bar Association President

The burden is not on me, or any member of the faculty, to establish the continuing viability of the Law School in Michigan. .. (it) has already been established to the satisfaction of the ABA.
-- Professor Joseph Falvey, AMSL faculty

It is thus with a heavy heart that I must tell you in all charity that the invitation to participate in AMSL's transition [move to AMU Florida] is among the coldest indignities I have yet endu#336600 in my life.
-- Daniel J. Kelly, former Editor-in-Chief, Ave Maria Law Review

The Law School appears to have become a place where grand gestures of powerful people are celebrated, but the miraculous, quotidian gestures by which God's grace is known are trivialized.
-- Kevin Lee, resignation letter, Ave Maria School of Law, Feb, 2007

Given the serious issues that plague the future of the Ave Maria community, the blind reaffirmation of confidence in the current Dean and President of the Law School seems to be frivolous and irresponsible at best and profoundly inconsistent with the high moral standards and solemn purpose called for by the mission of the Law School.
-- Kevin Lee, resignation letter, Ave Maria School of Law, Feb, 2007

(U.S. Education Finance Group) cultivated this relationship in order to get preferential treatment for student loans for the law school and... quote, I needed to play ball and not get in the middle of this thing.
-- AMU CFO under oath concerning student loan provider USEFG backed by Nick Healy, March 2005

Those in power quite obviously view this [Law Schol] as a community of convenience, and I will not stand for it.
-- Daniel J. Kelly, former Editor-in-Chief, Ave Maria Law Review

There are currently no plans to move to Naples..
-- Bernard Dobranski, AMSL Dean, January 2006

Dobranski said in an interview that its Board of Governors had decided on the move after five years of discussing its options.
-- Chronicle of Higher Education, February 2007

EMPLOYEE/STUDENT TREATMENT

But, if you're a tenu#336600 professor at another Catholic university and you see this happening, you say to yourself - If it could happen to Father Fessio, it could happen to anyone, so what's my incentive for going to Ave Maria?
-- Philip F. Lawler, Editor, Catholic World News, Washington Post, March 24, 2007

Such threats (against the faculty)... would be chilling in any atmosphere, let alone than at AMSL, which is under ABA investigation, and where the Dean already has had a vote of "no-confidence" registe#336600 against him by a substantial majority of the faculty.
-- Association of Ave Maria Faculty, April 30, 2007

I agree to refrain from actions which might embarrass the EMPLOYER or bring the EMPLOYER into disrepute. I understand that EMPLOYER may commence legal action to pursue its available legal or equitable remedies. In the event that EMPLOYER takes such steps to seek relief from an alleged breach of this paragraph...
-- Excerpt from AMC employee severance letter, emphasis added, 2005

It was devastating to the faculty when Nick Healy once said at a community meeting that "After all Boeing didn’t consult its employees when it moved its corporate headquarters." Catholic institutions are to be governed by Catholic principles of social justice and solidarity, not by the norms of ruthless secular enterprises.
-- Janet Smith, AMC professor, May 2003

How do you recommend a University whose leaders behave as they did in firing their best friend, their most loyal and devoted player [Fr. Fessio]?
-- Roger McCaffrey, former AMU employee