UH tunes out concerns over chancellor’s worth

The University ofHawaii’s disregard of public and legislative misgivings about a huge increase in salary and costs for the UH-Manoa chancellor reflects a disturbing tone-deafness to community sensibilities.

The Board of Regents approved hiring Tom Apple from the University of Dela­ware as Manoa chancellor for $439,008 a year, $100,000 more than his retiring predecessor, Virginia Hin­shaw, made.

The regents also gave Hin­shaw a 10-month sabbatical worth $287,000 and then a faculty position that pays $292,000 a year.

The big numbers raised eyebrows at a time when Hawaii is digging out from its worst recession ever, students are absorbing painful tuition hikes and unionized UH administrative staff are in their fourth year of furloughs and pay cuts.

It played out as some legislators and UH constituencies called for abolishing the chancellor’s office and returning to the practice of having the UH president head both the university system and the Manoa campus.

A changeover in chancellors would have been a perfect time to study whether the office that costs more than $14 million a year is earning its keep, but President M.R.C. Greenwood and regents plowed ahead without considering contrary input.

The position was created in 2001 on the promise that existing resources would be shifted and no additional expenses incurred.

But state Rep. Mark Takai, who tried unsuccessfully to abolish the chancellor’s office, said annual administrative costs grew $6.4 million after the new office formed, coming from academics.

Critics on campus, including the faculty union, said the division of responsibilities didn’t result in streamlining, but instead caused rivalries, end runs, more bureaucracy and duplication of services.

Greenwood and the regents dismissed the concerns without providing any comprehensive evaluation of the chancellor’s worth.

Greenwood declared there was plenty of work to go around and said arguments that the funds would be better spent on adding classes and instructors were "false comparisons."

She suggested Apple’s $439,000 salary was geared to what he made in Dela­ware, but in fact, she announced last October — before the candidate search began — that she intended to increase the pay to that level.

Now that the chancellor’s salary is so close to Greenwood’s $475,000, it’ll be most interesting to see whether there’s a push to also increase her pay.

To put this in perspective, in the coming year salaries for Greenwood and Apple and the sabbatical for Hin­shaw will add up to a total compensation of $1.2 million to run the two offices.

Former UH President Kenneth Mortimer, whodid both jobsreasonablyablya little more than a decade ago, was paid $167,184.

Can UH seriously argue there’s been that big an improvement in fulfilling its mission of educating our children and growing UH as an economic engine for our state?

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Reach David Shapiro at volcanicash@gmail.com or blog.volcanicash.net.