Ohio's University Presidents Won't See Pay Cuts

[OhioChick]

Source: AP

7:52 pm EST February 5, 2009

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Ohio's university presidents and their senior advisers, who rank among the state's highest paid public employees, will not be asked by Gov. Ted Strickland to take the pay and benefits cuts he's asking most state employees to take.

Led by Ohio State University president Gordon Gee, the highest paid public university president in America, the 154 individuals at Ohio's 14 four-year public institutions made a combined $35 million last year, according to figures compiled by The Associated Press.

Gee makes $775,008 a year before bonuses. The median salary for public university presidents in the state is $355,000, the data show.

Strickland seeks a 6 percent pay cut from unionized agency workers in the upcoming two-year budget. If such a cut were applied to all university presidents and their cabinets, it would amount to about $2.1 in million savings.

Strickland spokeswoman Amanda Wurst says the governor's budget plan targets only state agencies over which he has direct authority for the pay and benefits concessions -- which includes his own office. Along with the pay cut, he has asked state workers to assume 10 percent of their health insurance premiums to make ends meet.

Read more: http://www.newsnet5.com/education/18652295/detail.html

[Muttocracy]

1. Cornell's President Skorton is taking a voluntary 10% pay cut

http://www.cornell.edu/president/statements/2009/20090125-fy2009-budget.cfm

older article from Dec. 2008 Cornell Daily Sun with lots of detail figures for various universities

http://cornellsun.com/section/news/content/2008/12/04/skorton-forgoes-salary-increase-light-economy


President David Skorton received $730,604 in total compensation in 2006-7. It is the combination of $516,223 in pay and $214,381 in benefits. More recent information was not available, though the trend would suggest that his salary likely increased in 2007-08.

[ChromeFoundry]

2. And he is worth this much...why?

Gee's presidency at Brown, which he held for only two years, was mired in controversy. According to The Village Voice and the College Hill Independent, one of the university's campus newspapers, Gee received much criticism from students and faculty for treating the school as a Wall Street corporation rather than an Ivy League university.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Gee

[sasquatch]

3. I don't know how to react towards this

[davidinalameda]

4. Gee sits on the board of Massey Energy

not one of the best corporate citizens around

[OhioBlue]

8. I don't like Massey at all.

I visited one of their strip mines in WV. My b/f's uncle works there and he took us through. He showed us a field with about a dozen small, sick looking evergreens in it. He said, ya see - that is the reclamation and the trees that Massey planted. They won an award for the number of trees that they had planted, but the thing is they go through with some kind of machine, drop in seedlings, don't properly plant them or care for them and probably less than 5% last more than a year. They are also horrible neighbors for the residents in WV. They're also big time anti-union.

[bulloney]

5. College president wages is one of my pet peeves.

The salaries are only a part of their lavish compensation packages. Many of the colleges I know of also furnish the HOME of the president and family. Presidents of middle and large colleges in Ohio often have a six-figure expense account, free country club membership, a car and the usual insurances and pensions found in a lot of other packages. With all of that, what do they need a salary for?

Then, these people will piss and moan about how they have to increase tuition and room-and-board every year several times above the rate of inflation because of their cost of doing business. Seems to me they can at least be symbolic and freeze their wages or take a cut in pay. College costs are to the point where a student will end up with a six-figure debt after four years to go into a job market that is as uncertain and volatile as it's ever been.

Seems to me that if we're really serious about getting Americans prepared for 21st century jobs, college should be made affordable.

[ixion]

6. University Presidents are blood sucking scum bags, imo

that the University would be much better off without.


You want to know why college tuition rates have skyrocketed? Here's your reason: ADMINISTRATORS

That's where all the money goes. The University doesn't see it. The faculty doesn't see it, but the administrators, they see plenty.

[boobooday]

7. Meanwhile faculty are facing layoffs and staff are paid below subsistence levels

I have been at 3 universities in the past 20 years and the corporate model of outlandish top-level compensation has just gotten worse and worse.

[OhioBlue]

9. Well, I think the University President's salaries are outrageous

but, I think I understand the Governor's point here.

Feel free to correct me if I am wrong - I'm absolutely no expert on State finances...

But if he made cuts in the budget that reflect pay cuts and higher co-pays for departments that he has direct control over, then he knows what savings there will be from the cuts that he can control.

However, he couldn't necessarily reduce a budget line item by 10% of a College President's salary and be assured that indeed the President's salary would be reduced - probably the board of trustees or something does that. So if he cut the budget by that amount, it would essentially be up to the University to decide where to reduce their budget - they may opt to reduce faculty or cut some community programs.

He could however lobby State Universities to show restraint and good faith and do this.

[geiger]

10. Since these universities are now "publically supported" rather than public,

perhaps the Governor thinks he should tread lightly.

But, not only are these university Presidents leaving the Governor in the dark, their behavior is unconsciable.

I can offer a personal example: they can't even get their acts together to offer doctoral online degrees (I just got back from a residency where they call traditional students "on-ground;" if that doesn't give you a clue as to how fast the world is changing, I don't know what will). I have had to go out of state to obtain an online doctoral degree in education administration. That means $53,000 of Ohio money is going to help economically develop some other state. It pisses me off.

I do and do not apologize; I am just fed up with bullshit.