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Reported salary demand corners board
The State Board of Higher Education may
have painted themselves into a very tight corner
with their selection of George Weathersby as a
candidate to succeed out-going Chancellor Roy
Lieuallen. And as with almost all things in the state
of Oregon, that tight corner the board is painted in
is surrounded by green — as in money.
The specific obstacle in the Weathersby ap
pointment appears to be his reported $90,000
salary request. That reported salary demand was
blasted by Eugene Democrat Sen. Edward
Fadeley, who called it “grossly insensitive.”
Weathersby, in Portland over the weekend for
discussions with the board, was “reluctant to
comment” on the $90,000 salary and neither
confirmed nor denied the figure.
If the reported $90,000 salary demand is true
— and there is no evidence to doubt that it isn’t —
Weathersby would become Oregon’s highest paid
state official. Dr Leonard Laster, president of the
Oregon Health Sciences University (OHSU) is
presently the highest paid, earning about $80,000
annually. But compare Weathersby’s reported
asking salary and Gov. Vic Atiyeh’s salary: Atiyeh
earns only slightly more than $55,000 in his role as
governor. Compare also the average faculty salary
at state institutions which ranges from a bottom of
$10,000 to a top (at OHSU) of $65,000 — with the
mean being about $25,000
The present salary of the chancellor is
$69,516, which will be increased 5.3 percent along
with statewide academic staff as of July 1 The
salary will again be increased another 4 percent in
May of 1983. By then the chancellor s salary will
be almost $76,000. Along with this the chancellor
is given use of a furnished house and $18,000 a
year for the upkeep. The chancellor is also
provided with an expense allowance incidental to
the position This expense allowance is nearly
$5,000 a year.
There’s little doubt that the Harvard- and
Berkeley-educated Weathersby, presently Indian
a’s commissioner for higher education, is going to
shake things up in the state system His ideas on
making the educational institution more financial
ly productive are radical. Board members are
concerned with securing a quality chancellor,
and they have the notion you get what you pay
for.
But is Weathersby worth that much? And if the
board opts to meet his reported salary demands
will Weathersby become more of a liability than an
asset?
The reported salary demand betrays an in
adequate understanding of the present economic
situation in Oregon, and its effect on the state's
system of higher education At a time when faculty
are being asked to accept a six-montn postpone
ment of a deserved salary increase, how can the
board in good conscience pay Weathersby what
he reportedly demands? This $90,000 figure, if
actual, sets a relationship between Weathersby
and the board that may be characterized as other
than cooperative
If Weathersby has indeed demanded a salary
of $90,000, the board should not shy away from
offering Weathersby the chancellor's post at the
present salary level And if Weathersby won't
accept anything under his reported demand, then
the search for Lieuallen's replacement should be
reopened
I
letters
Rudeness
The National Security Con
ference was an ambitious
project of regional significance
ASUO co-planners should be
congratulated for bringing a
timely program of this stature to
our campus
I have concerns, however,
about the reported rudeness of
our audiences More important
ly, the attitudes expressed by
some student leaders merit ex
amination
From one student leader, we
learn that “in order to under
stand both points of view, you
have to listen, ” and “ if we
persist in this kind of behavior,
the only people (that) will come
to Eugene are people we al
ready agree with." Contrast that
with comments by that same
student in the same article:
“The speakers may have de
served the comments they got.
Experienced speakers should
know when they come to a col
lege campus that this is what
they are going to get "
One of the national speakers
here as our guest said, “This is
the rudest college audience I've
spoken to in the last five years "
That is a strong statement not to
be taken lightly No one is com
plaining about what may have
been said, but there is comment
needed on how we go about
communicating Adjectives de
scribing rude include primitive,
uncivilized, and uncouth, none
qualities that accurately de
scribe almost all of our students
Yet, that is the label given the
University because of a very
few, (some probably not
students)
We should not overlook the
statement of a qualified national
speaker who stated un
equivocably the conduct at the
University is the worst he’s
seen. That is not the same mes
sage we hear from our student
leader when he rationalizes that
student audiences are this way
everywhere. I don’t believe that
and I don’t believe the Universi
ty community needs to be em
barrassed nationality by the un
civilized deportment by a few
Vincent J. Bilotta
Susan Campbell Hall
KZEL radio
Concerning the Emerald s
story on KZEL-FM How can
anyone patronize a radio sta
tion, whose once progressive
character has been totally
epoxied over with a format —
abstractly arranged to endorse
certain predictable economic
patterns — and influenced by
the corporate media executives
of a mysterious and unaccoun
table "programming service” in
Atlanta, Georgia? (No wonder
we never hear black music on
KZEL ) Sure their ratings are
high, but to call KZEL nonpareil
is a joke; as if the airwaves of
Eugene were crammed with
competitive all-day mega-watt
hard-rock stations
But, hey kids, how about that
"local hit" morning show
"Breakfast with the Beatles"
with featured "artist" Van Halen
— again Tomorrow, they'll fea
ture Led Zepplin — again And
those DJs — funnnnnnny! Who
cares that they got their start in
little red-neck towns like Char
lottesville, N.C. and Spokane,
Wash ; after my first joint in the
morning, I'll laugh at their
amour propre humor anytime
These guys really know where
it's at
DJ Dan Clark, who admits
he’s “pretty weird sometimes"
(yeah, AC/DC is great creative
input), really summed up KZEL
Atlanta s attitude that KZEL's
old free-form style was too un
structured and not homogen
ous enough Homogenity is ob
viously KZEL Atlanta's answer
to creativity and structure a
control of unwanted forms of
behavior (i e , New Wave),
KZEL Atlanta is exactly the
kind of situation that Elvis Cos
tello warns us about in his song
"Radio. Radio'
"Radio is in the hands
of such a lot of fools
trying to anesthetize
the way that you feel "
Ralph McDaniel
Senior, architecture
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