By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
The Bowling Green State University Board of Trustees gave President Mary Ellen Mazey a vote of confidence in the form of a 3-percent pay increase, plus a bonus that goes toward her deferred compensation.
The raise will bring Mazey’s compensation to $424,360. Also, a contribution of $61,800, 15 percent of her pay, will be made to her deferred compensation package, as required by her contract. The board added another $50,000 contribution to her deferred compensation package, which she will receive upon leaving the university.
Her contract runs through 2019. Mazey said “we’ll see” when asked about if she’d continue beyond that date. She did say it is important to see the $200 million comprehensive fundraising campaign through to successful completion.
Megan Newlove, who chairs the board, the increased compensation is “based on her performance and where we are as an institution.”
She cited an improvement in retention rates, enrollment, facilities upgrades, the progress in completing the master plan, and the comprehensive campaign which has raised just over $100 million.
“You always want the board to be supportive,” Mazey said, not just of her, but the university.
Asked to respond to those who would question the raise, she said, it came down to benchmarking what she makes compared to presidents at other similar institutions. That’s the same approach taken to determine faculty, staff, and administration salaries.
In other action, the trustees approved the creation of the School of the Built Environment. The new school, within the College of Technology, Architecture, and Applied Engineering, brings together the Department of Architecture and Environmental Design and the Department of Construction Management.
Provost Rodney Rogers said the new school responds to the needs of industry. Architects, he said, are expected to know about construction management, and construction managers are expected to know about architecture.
The school will set BGSU apart from other Midwest universities, he said. Most of the other similar programs are located on the East and West coasts.
Mazey cited the new school as an example of the university responding to the needs of the market, and developing programs in areas that are in demand. She said programs in cyber security and social media are also in the works.
The trustees also approved the hiring of Arsenio Rodrigues as an associate professor with tenure, who will teach in the new school.
A complete renovation of the Technology Building is also one of the top priorities in in capital plan presented by Vice President for Finance Sheri Stoll.
“There’s a lot going on in our College of Technology,” she said. “We think there are significant opportunities we’d like to pursue, but you need the right facilities to support that.”
And those facilities need the proper support – HVAC, sewer, water, and gas lines, and electrical service.
“We have a tremendous amount of deferred maintenance and infrastructure need on campus,” Stoll said.
The university will submit a $22 million request to the state for capital improvements, though the request is unlikely to be fully funded, she said.
An additional $1.45 million was approved for preliminary work to transform Hanna Hall into the Maurer Center, the new home for the College of Business.
These funds will be used to move chilled water and gas lines from underneath the adjacent parking lot, construction management services, and creating prototype classroom spaces in the current College of Business.
These would give faculty a sense of what the new building will offer. These classrooms will still be used once the Maurer Center in completed by fall, 2020. The existing building will continue to be used as classroom space.
The cost of the project remains at $44.5 million.
The trustees also added $1 million to a fund that allows the university to purchase neighboring properties as they become available without requiring further approval from the trustees
In May $1 million was added to the fund, but $836,000 of that has been committed to purchasing four properties to the south of campus. The deals have not close nor been approved by the state, so Stoll declined to identify them.
Some of the purchases will be made through the BGSU Foundation and Centennial Falcon Properties, the entity set up to fund the construction of residence halls.
