In a period where financing for higher education is as erratic as the University of Alabama’s field-goal kicking, bloat and nepotism are the primary criticisms levied at the ivory towers of higher education in Louisiana.
Lawmakers who have trumpeted such claims have filed legislation seeking to cap University administrative salaries and were successful in blocking some of the extra costs proposed for students’ pocketbooks.
But perhaps the most salient and frequent proposals are to trim the administrative structure of public higher education in the state.
Currently, Louisiana sees its institutions governed by a series of oversight boards with a single board — the Board of Regents — coordinating these bodies.
The contention here is that these oversight boards are unnecessary, redundant for the proper administration of higher education and amount to little more than good-ole-boy clubs where knowing someone important earns you a six-digit salary.
Evidence, you ask?
You could perhaps take a look at our own University system, which oversees our University along with all others in the LSU System.
You could cite System President John Lombardi’s massive half-million-dollar salary — which is in the neighborhood of the nauseating market average for his position.
You could also cite the massive six-figure salaries enjoyed by more than 20 of the System office’s hierarchy.
But bullying bureaucrats fielding bloated paychecks is old hat, and focusing on such would only lead to headaches and miss something more interesting — the expanding empire.
In 2002, the LSU System office employed 38 positions.
In the past few years, the prophets of doom have preempted each legislative session with forecasts of financial ruin. In all, the flagship campus itself has taken about $50 million in state funding cuts in the past three years, according to Chancellor Michael Martin.
It should be noted the University has been spared serious bloodletting by Gov. Bobby Jindal’s creative accounting that sees student tuition increases as part of the state’s funding appropriation.
So surely, through all this, the System office has shrunk?
When it comes to the bureaucratic labyrinth that is higher education, there can be many answers to this seemingly yes-or-no question.
Through the shaking of fists, gnashing of teeth, annual tuition increases, three years of no instructor pay increases and teacher layoffs, the System office employed 57 positions as of 2011 — that’s about a 50 percent increase in staff size.
It should be noted that a number of these positions come from “restricted funds” which are not derived from taxpayer dollars. And to the System office’s credit, officials do claim to have shrunk their overall budget in the past few years.
Still, there is an expansion of bureaucracy, and — by my count — 13 of these added positions are paid a fat-cat salary in six figures.
Surely these salaries went to administrators with sterling reputations doing an absolutely vital job?
Well, in at least one example — Michael Gargano — this appears not to be the case.
You see, LSU System President Lombardi and Gargano go way back.
Around the turn of the century, Lombardi, then chancellor of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, hired Gargano as the vice chancellor for Student Affairs and Campus Life.
Fast-forward to 2008. The LSU System creates a new
position known as the vice president of Academic Support and chief of staff and gives it a massive $225,000 salary.
Who comes in to fill this position? Lombardi’s old friend Michael Gargano.
Maybe I’m being snarky, and perhaps Gargano was hired because Lombardi was witness to his meritorious conduct at U-Mass.
That also appears to be a bit of a stretch, as Gargano’s time at U-Mass was plagued with controversy from the students’ perspective.
First, Gargano received heavy criticism from students regarding what the University’s student paper called “ambivalent” handling of the “KKK-9” controversy, which started with a number of U-Mass Student Government
Association members drinking in their office aside a caricature of a klansman, according to reports in the U-Mass Daily Collegian.
According to these reports, students contend that Gargano was seeking to dismantle the SGA’s ALANA caucus and disrupt efforts to bring more diversity to the campus. That sentiment was not eased after Gargano referred to administrative efforts to seek a more affluent student body by saying “we need more Abercrombie & Fitch and less Old Navy,” as reported by The Daily Collegian.
All this controversy culminated in the SGA handing Gargano a vote of no confidence in 2004 — which was sent to then-Chancellor Lombardi after nearly unanimous passage and covered thoroughly by the student paper.
So what does a vote of no confidence by the students in your last job as overseer of Student Affairs get you?
If you’re friends with Lombardi, a $32,000 pay increase to move to a cheaper market.
Again, I could just be a paranoid observer, but it surely sniffs of cronyism to me.
So as the war drums of budget cuts begin to sound as the legislative session draws closer, is our University hierarchy providing effective leadership?
I vote no confidence.
Xerxes Wilson is a 22-year-old mass communication senior from Lucedale, Miss. Follow him on Twitter @Ber_Xerxes.