Gov. Sarah Palin may be the top executive of Alaska, but her salary is nothing compared to what some university employees earn.

Figures obtained through a state Public Records Act request show that 79 administrators and professors earned more than Palin's $125,000 salary in 2006. Administrators like President Mark Hamilton made up the bulk of that group, while 21 professors earned more than the governor.

"Some of the salaries may seem high compared to the other jobs, but we don't compete with the other jobs in, say, the state," said Jeannine Senechal, director of compensation at UA. "The comparison needs to be in other positions in higher education."

Hamilton, who received a retroactive pay bump thanks to his contract renewal in December, topped the list with $365,750 in 2006. UAF Chancellor Steve Jones ranked second with about $249,086.

Among professors, UAA Professor Jang Ra, the chair of the engineering and science management department, tops the list with $174,180. The highest-grossing professor at UAF is School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences' Gordon Kruse, who earned about $155,984.

The list does not include mid-year hires who had a contractual salary of more than $125,000 but were not at UA long enough in 2006 to earn that much. For example, Ro Bailey, who was hired in August, earns $167,640 contractually but is not on the list.

The numbers are based on calendar year earnings and include not just contractual salaries but also income earned from research grants, said university spokeswoman Kate Ripley. The pay figures also do not include benefits, which at UA equals about 35 percent of salaries.

"So this is going to match what's reported to the IRS," Ripley said.

The governor, on the other hand, is paid a flat rate of $125,000. There are some perks, like free use of the governor's mansion and state-paid travel. But the salary itself is basic.

In a statement, Palin said she encourages UA to continue seeking "to recruit and retain the best people."

 "However," she continued, "I want to make sure President Hamilton, all the university administration and the UA Board of Regents are looking for financial efficiencies and ways for the UA system to get the most bang for the buck, much like what we are doing in developing the state's budget."

TOO MUCH?

Paying university employees less than the governor isn't an option, Ripley said. Salaries need to be compared not among state employees but by market rate and discipline, she said.

"We have to pay market rate or we wouldn't attract new people," Ripley said. "Being under market is not our goal because it would not foster excellence or bring in new faculty."

But some people say that's too much. Robert Warner, a retired UAS professor in Ketchikan, recently complained about Hamilton's $300,000 salary in the letter pages of SitNews, an online newspaper based out of Ketchikan.

The Sun Star based its records request around a proposal Warner made in his letter: Every University of Alaska employee earning more than Palin should have his or her salary published in the major state newspapers.

"One of the factors that makes the costs of college so expensive is that they're paying out so much money to these university administrators," Warner said.

In total, these 79 individuals together earned $11.6 million, records show. Put in perspective, that equals around 14.5 percent of the $79.9 million in tuition and fees the university system took in during 2006.

Before he retired in 1997, Warner, 61, said he earned around $80,000 as an associate professor for library sciences. He said he's not upset that faculty members earn more than Palin, since they go through the collective bargaining process and also receive compensation through research grants.

"But I don't know of any other administrator who's ever done research," he said. "And I don't know of any that have taught any classes either."

WHO'S WHO

UAF employees made up the majority of the group earning more than Palin, with 45 people. UAA followed with 20 people. Eleven administrators for statewide earned that much, while only three people at UAS had bigger paychecks than what Palin's.

Administrators outnumber professors nearly three-to-one on the list. Carl Shepro, president of the United Academics faculty union, said he was "not surprised" by the gap between administrative and faculty pay when it came to top earners at UA.

"We've always felt that the administration received higher pay than faculty and that it was not just," he said.

Men make up the bulk of the top earners at UA. Only 14 females in the university system earned more than the governor in 2006. Only two of them, UAF professors Judith Kleinfeld and Kara Nance, were faculty. Twelve male faculty members earned more than the governor.

"It certainly is matching the data that we're finding that women are very much underpaid [compared to] what men make," said Sine Anahita, an assistant sociology professor and member of the UAF Faculty Senate's Committee on the Status of Women.

In 2006, 69 percent of women fell below the median faculty salary at UAF, $57,004.55, Anahita said. In contrast, only 39 percent of men were below that mark, she said. Ideally, both would be at 50 percent.

"It's a salary inequity that has persisted for generations," she said, adding the situation is improving.

HOW THEIR PAY WORKS

For faculty, salary rates come through collective bargaining with unions. Market rates are based on surveys by the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources (CUPA) and Oklahoma State University, which breaks positions down by discipline, Ripley said.

"We strive to pay as close to the market rate for faculty and staff," she said. "And for faculty that's for a variety of disciplines."

While most administrative salary funding sources at UA come from the university's general fund, many faculty members' salaries are funded through endowments and grants funded by outside sources.

"We're under an increasing pressure to write for grants to fund our salaries and fund our research," Anahita said.

In some cases, research funds increase faculty salaries, Ripley said; in other cases, the money funds salaries at their university contractual rate.

"It's not a one-size-fits-all thing," she said.

Kruse, the fisheries professor, says his funding is entirely from British Petroleum.

"They gave a very generous donation to the university about five years ago," he said.

His funding will run out this year.

AT MARKET?

As a rule of thumb, the university pays faculty and staff 10 percent below the going market rate, Ripley said. The going rate for staff and administrative pay is based on data collected by CUPA.

Asked why UA doesn't pay at-market, Senechal said, "We're trying to be fiscally as responsible as possible with the dollars we have. That's just a rule we have that's been successful."

Warner, the retired professor, was skeptical about basing pay around the market rate, especially when salaries are being increased based on data compiled by the colleges themselves through associations like CUPA.

"I kind of laugh at that because the market rate is very, very controlled by the administrative organizations," he said. "It's kind of like an exclusive club that if you're a member you work to keep your salaries high."

Even when UA does base pay around CUPA's data, it doesn't always produce the desired result, as seen with UA's highest paid employee, President Hamilton.

In 2004, the Board of Regents approved a new contract for Hamilton that specifically tied his salary to 90 percent of the average research university president's salary, as measured by CUPA. Regents had expected his salary to hit around $300,000. But when the survey came back saying he was owed around $276,000, they hired consultants and reevaluated his pay.

In December, the board raised increased Hamilton's salary to $300,000 for three years and promised a $210,000 bonus if he stayed through 2009. Then-Regent Chair Brian Rogers, the man largely behind drafting Hamilton's new contract, said it was money well spent.

"Anyone who thinks Mark Hamilton is only slightly above the average, I would beg to differ," he said at the December meeting. "I think we're getting a hell of a deal here."