State lawmakers take aim at UC brass’ lofty salaries

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/State-lawmakers-take-aim-at-UC-brass-lofty-6195307.php

State lawmakers from both parties are sending the University of California an angry message by advancing a bill to cap compensation for UC employees at $500,000 under penalty of losing public funding.

The bill, approved by the Assembly’s higher education committee last week, is a prime example of how Gov. Jerry Brown’s concerns over high spending at the public university have spread to the state Legislature, where the bill is one of six in play — all meant to bring UC to its knees by reining in its spending, restricting its ability to raise tuition and ending its constitutional autonomy.

The measure, AB837, and the other bills get at the heart of the irritation that students, lawmakers from both parties and Brown feel toward UC. Their complaint: The university keeps increasing compensation for its highest-paid employees while demanding that students pay more tuition and that the state contribute more toward its bottom line.

“As a Legislature, we have a right to ask where we should appropriate people’s dollars, because student tuition is skyrocketing,” said the author of AB837, Assemblyman Roger Hernández, D-West Covina (Los Angeles County).