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L.A. Now Live: Napolitano to head UC; Muslim regent appointed

Janet Napolitano testifies before the House Homeland Security Committee on Capitol Hill.
Janet Napolitano testifies before the House Homeland Security Committee on Capitol Hill.
(Evan Vucci / AP)
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During a meeting interrupted by protesters, the UC regents Thursday confirmed U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano as the next president of the 10-campus system.

Times education writer Larry Gordon will join L.A. Live at 9 a.m. Friday to discuss two high-profile appointments by the University of California: the naming of Napolitano as the new president and the confirmation of Sadia Saifuddin as the first Muslim to be named a student regent.

Both issues are landmarks in the trajectory of the UC system, and Gordon will help explain what they mean for students, professors and taxpayers. Join us with your questions.

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The regents set Napolitano’s base salary at $570,000 a year, which at her request is $21,000 less than the pay for current UC President Mark G. Yudof. That avoids a political furor about executive pay inflation, but it still will be a big raise from Napolitano’s annual Cabinet salary of about $200,000. She also will receive free housing in a UC-leased house, $8,916 a year for car expenses and $142,500 for one-time relocation costs.

Napolitano, the first female UC president, was appointed over the objections of protesters who contended that she should be disqualified because the Department of Homeland Security expanded deportations of people who entered the country illegally.

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