UMKC to pay temporary dean more than head of UM system

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- The salary of the University of Missouri-Kansas City's temporary biology dean exceeds those of not only the university chancellor but the head of the entire University of Missouri system.

Frank E. Horton has been hired to head the School of Biological Sciences for the next six months to a year, beginning Aug. 19. Horton, 62, holds a doctorate in geography and headed three universities between 1980 and 1998.

Horton will be paid $264,000 a year to head the School of Biological Sciences, which faces possible extinction. The university announced his appointment Thursday.

Horton's pay exceeds the annual salaries of campus chancellor Martha Gilliland ($183,750); Manuel Pacheco, president of the four-campus University of Missouri system ($260,000); Richard Wallace, chancellor of the flagship Columbia campus ($212,920); and all other deans at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

The biology school has been without a dean since May 2001, when Gilliland demoted its longtime dean. This year, she suspended the search for a new one.

Too much research

Then, in May, Provost Steve Ballard said in a letter to biology professors that he was considering dissolving the school -- one of the university's top recipients of federal research grants -- because its professors focused too much on research and didn't cooperate with others on campus.

In a statement released by the university, Gilliland said Horton's pay was less than he normally receives for consulting work. The university already has paid Horton $10,000 for consulting with Gilliland over the past few months about the university's life sciences efforts.

Horton was interim president of Southern Illinois University between February and September 2000, president of the University of Toledo in Ohio from 1989 to 1998, president of the University of Oklahoma from 1985 to 1988, and chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee from 1980 to 1985.