UNR president Crowley gets contract extension

Friday, Aug. 9, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- Joseph Crowley, who has headed the University of Nevada, Reno since 1978, is being given a new three-year contract, which will make him the longest serving president ever at the Reno campus.

Crowley, 63, started in 1966 as an instructor in the political science department and eventually became chairman.

In 1978 he was named acting president and was appointed to the job permanently in March 1979. When he completes his new term he will have surpassed the 20-year tenure records set by Presidents Joseph Stubbs and Walter Clark.

To his supporters, he has been a steady rock in a university system often in turmoil. The Reno campus has avoided the major controversies that have hit UNLV. His critics say new blood is needed to reinvigorate the Reno campus.

Crowley just completed a successful fund-raising drive that collected more than $120 million over a six-year period. While most of the growth has centered in Las Vegas recently, research grants and graduate student enrollment have increased by double digits in the last few years.

With his new contract will come a raise in his basic salary from $159,747 to $167,989 for this fiscal year plus retirement benefits, which brings the pay to $183,250.

The board of regents of the University and Community College System of Nevada met today in Elko to approve the Crowley contract extension and to vote on pay raises for university presidents.

The pay of UNLV President Carol Harter will go to $169,357, up from the present $161,200; Richard Moore, president of the Community College of Southern Nevada, will advance from $124,788 to $131,102; Jim Randolph at Western Nevada Community College in Carson City will rise to $105,575, a $5,575 raise; Ronald Remington of Great Basin Community College in Elko received a three-year extension on his contract and will receive a pay increase from $108,87 to $117,772; Kenneth Wright of Truckee Meadows Community College in Reno from $110,000 to $114,433 and James Taranik of the Desert Research Institute from $148,296 to $152,026.

Crowley