Resentment Voiced Over 100% Raise for Trustees

Trustees of the San Diego Community College District have doubled their salaries by accepting a state-mandated pay increase--an increase that angered some professors who settled for 5% raises last year.

The raise brought the trustees’ monthly salaries to $1,500 from $750, said Barry Garron, the district’s information officer.

The increase, authorized last fall by Gov. George Deukmejian, was slated to begin Jan. 1, but trustees delayed accepting it until advisers were certain the state code applied to them, Garron said.

The community college trustees are now paid the same as trustees of the San Diego Unified School District. The Unified School District trustees accepted their pay increase in early January. The state code says that both boards “shall” make the same amount, Garron said.

“If it had gone the other way and the unified (school district trustees) had lower salaries, they (community college trustees) would have had to accept that,” he said.

The raise, which was approved Wednesday by the trustees, angered some community college professors who reluctantly settled for a 5% increase last April, Al Ickstadt, president of the faculty senate at Mesa College, said Friday.

“The issue is, ‘Are they not treating us unfairly and treating themselves extra fairly?’ ” Ickstadt said. “It kind of bothers me that there would be legislation like that.”

Professors are not saying the trustees do not deserve the money, Ickstadt said. Professors are angry because the raise shows a lack of concern for the feelings of professors.

“The way I feel about it is that they (trustees) work hard,” Ickstadt said. “But what disturbs me is that it was approved without any public discussion.”

Board President Dan Grady said he believes most trustees felt the pay increase was well-deserved. He added that he knows nothing about professors being angry about the raise.

“If they were upset, then they were upset by themselves, because no one has spoken to me,” Grady said.