[UPDATED AT 4:30 P.M.] The MCC board of trustees voted this afternoon to continue the current search process to find a new president. The vote was 7 to 1, with only trustee John Parrinello voting for his motion to "abort" the process and begin a new one. Trustees Richard Warshof and Ilene Flaum were not at the meeting. (An earlier version of this article reported that the vote was 8 to 1.)

Parrinello had insisted that the search process was not legitimate because the full board did not approve the establishment of the search committee. In today's meeting, he also said that there was no need to rush the search and that the college would be stronger if a new search was instituted. Former Board Chair Lori Van Dusen, who as chair had appointed the search committee, said during the meeting that the board's bylaws give the chair the responsibility for appointing committees. Previous board chairs, she said, including Parinello, had followed the same practice. (You can read a statement by Van Dusen here.)

While some board members said they agreed with Parrinello's concerns, all except Parrinello voted to continue with the current process and interview the four finalists.

The vote ends at least temporarily, a contentious period for the college and its board. The search process has been controversial for several months, with critics charging that Republicans planned to appoint former County Legislature Majority Leader Bill Smith as president. During a special meeting in February, the board voted to remove Van Dusen as chair. And after the search committee named its two finalists, the six-member board majority, led by the new chair, Richard Guon, added two local candidates: Smith and business owner Dennis Kessler. The search committee had reviewed applications from both men and concluded that they were not as well qualified as the two finalists the committee had selected: Kenneth Ender, president of Cumberland County College in New Jersey, and Laurence Spraggs, president of Broome Community College in Binghamton.

Today's vote may not change things, however. The final selection will be made by the full board, and the six trustees who voted to add Smith and Kessler to the finalists' list could select one of them over the two non-local candidates.

Parrinello added one more bit of drama to the search process today: during his statement supporting his desire to conduct a new search, he spoke twice of his hope for "a newly constituted board." That might mean that he wants some of the four dissidents on the board removed. He did not explain what he meant, however, and no board member questioned him about it. It's not clear how the composition of the board could be "reconstituted." Nine of the 10 board members serve seven-year terms; the student trustee serves for one year. Only two trustees' terms expire in 2008: student David Ladwig's and Michael Nuccitelli's. Both Ladwig and Nuccitelli opposed the addition of Smith's and Kessler's names to the list of finalists, but the student trustee is elected by MCC students, and Nuccitelli is one of five trustees appointed by the governor. Since the governor is now a Democrat, it's not likely that he would appoint someone recommended by the local Republican leaders if local Democrats objected.

The tenor of today's meeting was a strong contrast to the volatile March meeting when the board voted to add Smith and Kessler to the mix. Today, the nearly 200 people - including faculty, staff, students, parents, and media - who had crowded into the meeting room, sat listening quietly and intently.

There had been no sense of what the board would do today; other than Parrinello, all of the board members had refused to talk to the media. After Parrinello made a lengthy, calm presentation of his reasons for wanting a new search process, Nuccitelli, Ladwig, and Van Dusen spoke against the change. As soon as trustee Richard Mackey began to speak, however, it was clear that Parrinello wouldn't get the board's support.

Mackey said that while he felt some of "the same frustration" that Parrinello had expressed about the search process, he thought the process should continue. Mackey, former deputy county executive, is one of the six trustees who approved adding Smith and Kessler to the finalists' list.