Star Tribune
University of Minnesota regents approve more than $1 million contract with new President Rebecca Cunningham
Incoming University of Minnesota President Rebecca Cunningham will begin work this summer and earn more than $1 million per year after U regents on Friday unanimously approved her contract.
“I sometimes struggle with these very expensive employment agreements,” said Regent Robyn Gulley. But, she added, “I also feel like there was a lot of care taken for it to be right-sized in a lot of ways.”
Cunningham’s contract will put her total compensation in the top quarter for leaders of Big Ten universities, and some regents said they considered that range while negotiating.
Regents last month selected Cunningham, a medical doctor working as vice president for research and innovation at the University of Michigan, to serve as the next U president. The U president oversees a system that includes five campuses that together enroll more than 68,000 students and employ roughly 27,000 people.
The figures in Cunningham’s contract aren’t surprising, said James Finkelstein, a professor emeritus of public policy at George Mason University, who has researched compensation for university presidents across the country. “We’ve been seeing this increase in salaries creeping up,” he said.
He cautioned that it can be difficult to compare presidential contracts in a meaningful way, even within a single conference. Presidents tend to structure their contracts differently and their job responsibilities vary. While some university executives oversee an entire system, others are responsible for one location.
U presidential contracts have in the past sometimes elicited strong debate, with some regents saying they worried about paying large amounts to presidents while students struggled to afford tuition increases, and others arguing it was essential to provide competitive pay if they wanted the best leader. Regents on Friday overwhelmingly expressed support for Cunningham’s contract.
While negotiating Cunningham’s contract, U regents reviewed data from a national organization that compiles higher education human resources information and found that total cash compensation for Big Ten executives ranges from roughly $890,000 to $1.2 million.
Cunningham is set to earn more than $1 million per year, an amount similar to what the U expected to pay former President Joan Gabel before she left to take another job. Their contracts, though are structured differently.
Gabel had been on track to earn about $1.14 million this fiscal year, with about $749,000 of that being base pay and the remainder given in the forms of retirement contributions, performance bonuses and other allowances.
Cunningham’s contract calls for her to receive close to $1.1 million, with $975,000 of that being base pay and $120,000 coming in retirement contributions. The agreement also calls for housing allowances and moving expenses, the amounts of which aren’t specified.
It also includes raises in future years, based either on the increases provided to professional and administrative employees at the U or a 3.5% increase, whichever is greater.
Finkelstein and his research partner, Judith Wilde, said they are starting to see more schools structure their contracts this way. Since many schools frequently give presidents their entire bonuses anyway, “they just decided let’s skip that and we’ll just add that to the base and move on,” Finkelstein said.
Cunningham wasn’t at the meeting. In a statement Thursday, after the details of her contract were publicly released, she thanked the board for its support and said: “I can’t wait to continue getting to know more about the great people at the University of Minnesota, learning from Interim President [Jeff] Ettinger, and immersing myself in the U of M’s work later this spring.”
Star Tribune
Sentencing set for Monday morning for a Minnesota man who was drunk and speeding when he hit a woman’s SUV and killed her.
A man with a history of driving drunk received a four-year term Monday for being intoxicated and speeding when he hit a woman’s SUV on a southern Minnesota highway and killed her.
John R. Deleo, 54, of Lake Crystal, Minn., was sentenced in Brown County District Court after pleading guilty to criminal vehicular homicide in connection with the crash on Aug. 17, 2023, in New Ulm at Hwy. 68 and S. 15th Street that killed 82-year-old Sharon A. Portner, of New Ulm.
With credit for the two days he was in jail after his arrest, Deleo is expected to serve the first 2⅔ years years of his term in prison and the balance on supervised release.
A week ahead of sentencing, defense attorney James Kuettner asked the court to spare his client prison and put him on probation for up to five years.
Kuettner pointed out in his filing that Deleo stayed at the crash scene and attempted “to aid Portner, and he left [her] side only when directed to by law enforcement.”
The attorney also noted that Deleo has been sober since the crash, and therefore, at a particularly low risk for reoffending.
According to the criminal complaint:
Police arrived to find the two damaged vehicles near 15th and S. Broadway streets. Emergency responders took Portner to New Ulm Medical Center, where she died that day.
ROCHESTER – The defense for Shane Roper, the former state trooper charged for his role in a crash that killed Owatonna teenager Olivia Flores, has asked the court to dismiss eight of the nine charges against him.
In a motion filed Oct. 24, Roper’s attorneys said the state has “failed to meet its burden of offering direct evidence tending to demonstrate that [Roper’s] actions, or negligence, were the proximate cause of death or bodily harm.”
Roper, 32, faces nine criminal charges related to the May 18 crash, including felony charges of second-degree manslaughter and criminal vehicular homicide. Both charges carry maximum sentences of 10 years in jail.
The only charge the defense did not ask to have dismissed is a misdemeanor for careless driving, which carries a maximum sentence of 90 days in jail.
Among the other requests made to the court, Roper’s defense asked for a change of venue outside of Olmsted County, citing the extensive media coverage of the case. The defense said “jury pools have surely been tainted and a fair trial cannot be had” in the county.
Roper’s attorney, Eric Nelson of Halberg Criminal Defense, also argued that any evidence related to Roper’s prior speeding or traffic incidents should be precluded as evidence in the case.
In the five years leading up to the crash, Roper had been disciplined by the State Patrol on four separate occasions for careless or reckless driving, including a February 2019 crash that injured another officer.
District Judge Christa Daily has not responded to the motions. Roper is scheduled to be back in court Nov. 21 for a pretrial settlement conference.
Star Tribune
Who is comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who insulted Puerto Rico at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally?
NEW YORK — Of the nearly 30 speakers who recently warmed up the crowd for Donald Trump at Madison Square Garden, comedian Tony Hinchcliffe got the most attention for racist remarks.
”I don’t know if you guys know this, but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. I think it’s called Puerto Rico,” he said, later including lewd and racist comments about Latinos, Jewish and Black people.
The comments have led to condemnation from Democrats and Puerto Rican celebrities, with Ricky Martin sharing a clip of Hinchcliffe’s set, captioned: “This is what they think of us.”
The Trump campaign took the rare step of distancing itself from Hinchcliffe. ”This joke does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign,” senior adviser Danielle Alvarez said in a statement.
Here’s what to know about Hinchcliffe, his comedic styling and the response to his Madision Square Garden comments.
Hinchcliffe, raised in Youngstown, Ohio, is a stand-up comedian who specializes in the roast style, in which comedians take the podium to needle a celebrity victim with personal and often tasteless jokes. He has written and appeared on eight Comedy Central Roasts, including ones for Snoop Dogg and Tom Brady.
Even fellow comedians aren’t immune. At the Snoop Dogg roast, Hichcliffe made a joke referencing comedian Luenell, who is Black, being on the Underground Railroad. Of the honoree, he said: ”Snoop, you look like the California Raisin that got hooked on heroin.”
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