The state’s highest paid worker is none other than Jeff Tedford, the head football coach at Cal.
Cal’s seven-year postseason streak was snapped this weekend, when it lost to Washington. Cal finished the season 5-7. The team is going in reverse, and it comes as the school’s athletic program is cutting other sports, as I’ve written previously.
“Last week, the UC Regents voted to raise student tuition by 8%. Many UC Berkeley students protested the hike, and some were arrested. But while Cal Berkeley students join the rest of their UC colleagues in paying more, the school’s football coach, Jeff Tedford, has a $2.5 million contract that makes him the highest paid state employee,” according to Beyond Chron.
“He earned $2,831,653.50 in 2007-08, and currently earns $2.3 million. He was given a contract extension at this exorbitant amount through 2015, despite not having taken Cal to a major bowl game in several years.
“While no state money is used for Tedford’s contract (it is paid by donations to the athletic department), it has no buyout provision; this means that Cal would have to use public funds — as much as $10 million — if they now fired him. The only hope for long suffering Cal football fans is that Tedford looks in the mirror, realize he’s taking advantage, and resigns.”
As a Cal graduate and lifelong fan I wanted to support the Tedford regime, but this shows how college sports is out of control at the expense of academics.
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Wonder if he is in the University pension system
John
John I’m with you on this one, I don’t like this one little bit.
I like football, but I hate to see it hurt academics. I know it is a two-way street. Football programs bring a university recognition and dollars. I’m with John and Steve on the pension question. I’m all for people getting pensions but not extravagant pensions at either the expense of taxpayers or students. In all things, including pensions, moderation.
Travelzoo was offering tickets to this weekend’s game at 40 percent off, but there were still empty seats.
http://www.travelzoo.com/last-minute/san-francisco/908581/
Sad.
If donations go down does Tedford’s pay go down?
Let’s see the “top 100″ donor list for the Cal athletic department.
Almost as bad as our 3 (three) County Executive Officers at $500K per year, probably close to $1M with benefits!
Here is a link to a story about how Cal Athletics is weathering the budget crisis. A $320 million renovation of the football stadium is being funded over the next 30 years.
http://californiawatch.org/watchblog/amid-fiscal-crisis-uc-berkeley-commits-320-million-football
As the story points out “there’s a financial disconnect” and much risk involved. The “seat licenses” will go for several thousand dollars; last weekend, Travelzoo was offering seats for the final game at a 40 percent discount. The reporter is a longtime S.F. Examiner investigative writer Lance Williams. He is asking the right questions that the Bay Area media is not.