Newest CIRM Board Member is USC Medical School Dean Carolyn Meltzer

The Los Angeles school has received $159 million from the agency

The University of Southern California (USC), which has received $159 million from the state stem cell agency, once again has a seat on the agency’s 35-member governing board, which has final authority on how millions of dollars are spent on research. 

The latest USC employee to sit on the board is Carolyn Meltzer, dean of the USC School of Medicine. She said looks forward to serving on the board and making “the greatest health impact possible.” USC has had a seat on the board for most of the agency’s existence.

The CIRM board currently has at least 18 members whose institutions have received hundreds of millions of dollars in grants. Board members are barred from voting on specific awards to their institutions but vote regularly on “concept plans” that will benefit their institutions and others. 

The situation was built in by the ballot initiative that created the stem cell agency (the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine -- CIRM) in 2004. At one point in 2012, 92 percent of awards had gone to institutions that had ties to members of the board.  A 2020 review of awards showed that the percentage had receded to 80 percent, according to the California Stem Cell Report. 

In 2012, the National Academy of Medicine found that CIRM was rife