This is a cut-n-paste from a recent post-gazette article. Read it and scream if you want to.
Thursday, October 04, 2007
By Tracie Mauriello, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
HARRISBURG -- Richard E. Willey, the embattled president of the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency, announced today he would move his retirement up to next week after a highly ceritical report from state Auditor General Jack Wagner.
Mr. Willey had announced last week he would resign at the end of the year.
Mr. Wagner's audit revealed additional questionable expenses at the agency and led to a call for his immediate resignation by state Sen. Sean Logan, D-Monroeville. Mr. Willey said he will retire next Wednesday.
Mr. Wagner said the agency has has recklessly spent millions on bonuses and incentives, including a $108,000 Hersheypark outing. That's money that could have been better used to help needy students, Mr. Wagner told Capitol reporters this morning.
"The $6.4 million given out (in bonuses) over the past three years could have paid for 1,702 grants or it could have been used to forgive 2,563 grants of $2,500 each," Mr. Wagner said as he presented an interim audit report.
Hours later, Mr. Willey announced his decision to leave.
PHEAA officials have said that the bonuses --- which were as much as $180,857 this year --- were necessary to retain talented executives to run the international student loan business, which generates profits that fund programs for Pennsylvania students.
Mr. Wagner doubts that.
The base salary alone for Mr. Willey is $289,118. That's "almost double the salary of the governor of the commonwealth," Mr. Wagner said.
Add Mr. Willey's bonus and his total compensation this year will be $469,975.
Most egregious, Mr. Wagner said, is that employment contracts for the top 23 executives --- who received the highest of the 350 bonuses --- specify that the payments should count as salary and therefore be used to calculate pensions, which are based on each employee's top three earning years. That provision is unusual and did not apply to middle management or union employees' bonuses, which averaged about $3,000 this year, Mr. Wagner said.
Mr. Willey, who recently announced plans to retire at the end of the year, is eligible for a pension of roughly $370,000.
The interim report recommends an immediate end to bonuses for all employees.
The board's vice chairman, state Sen. Sean Logan, already has said he will work toward eliminating bonuses and restructuring salaries.
Mr. Wagner warned today that salaries should not be adjusted upward to compensate for the discontinuation of bonuses.
