President Manuel T. Pacheco, Provost Paul Sypherd and other top University of Arizona administrators get a lot of flak. From cutting departments to stray hairs in Louie Burgers, the administration is often singled out as the root of all evil on the UA campus. It's easy to stereotype them as heartless bureaucrats only concerned about the university's research rankings. Well, we here at the Wildcat recognize that administrators are working hard to serve the best interests of the students. But whether we always agree with what they think is in "our best interest" is a completely different story. Now that we got that off our chests, on with the editorial.
Perusing over the 1994-95 UA budget, more than a dozen administrators received pay raises totaling more than $144,000. Vice Provost and College of Business Dean Kenneth R. Smith received a 23 percent pay raise from $109,043 to $133,900. Vice President for Research Michael Cusanovich received a 17 percent increase from $94,330 to $110,725. Other administrators got pay raises ranging from 6 percent to 15 percent. On the other hand, the rest of the UA faculty and staff only got a state-mandated pay raise of 3 percent. Interesting. Very interesting.
When one looks at the 1993-94 salaries of UA administrators in comparsion to their peers at other universities, UA administrators were paid below the national average. So did our administrators deserve pay raises? Sure. They do their best in relatively thankless jobs. In the long-run, the pay raises will probably save money. Sypherd said that three top administrators recently were offered positions at other universities. It's probably cheaper to give current administrators pay raises than have to spend money searching for qualified people to fill vacant positions and then enticing them to come to the university.
We don't have a problem with administrative pay raises per se, but we do have a problem with how they were handled. Pacheco and Sypherd have said that the extra $144,000 came from university savings and not from funds that would have gone to faculty and staff salaries. But that explanation doesn't answer some serious questions. If the administration can find $144,000 in university savings for administrative pay raises, why can't it find the money to continue funding the journalism department? Exactly where did this $144,000 come from? We're not making accusations. We're just curious.
Also if administrators are considering giving pay raises to themselves, they should notify students and faculty before they set aside the money. Was there any student input at all? Why wasn't the student body at-large notified about it? It's a matter of checks and balances. Just as we would find it unacceptable for state legislators to give themselves pay raises without notifying their constituents, we also find the administration's action unacceptable. We aren't asking administrators to tell us every move they plan to make, but $144,000 is a significant chunk of change. We have a right to know what the administration does with our tuition money.
It's the administration's duty to notify their constituents, students and faculty, when they are considering giving themselves pay increases. It's also just plain common sense for the administration to be as forthcoming as possible about the issue. When some faculty members wake up in the morning, pick up the newspaper off their doorsteps and see a glaring headline announcing a 23 percent pay increase for UA administrators, they are going to resent it. When students hear about administrative pay raises through the grapevine, they are going to nod their heads and say, "That's why I can't get into classes." In times of budgetary belt-tightening, the administration should be especially conscious to justify actions which could be perceived as solely self-beneficial.
The problems we have with the pay raise issue arise from communication. In this case, the UA administration did a less than exemplary job.