They may toil in ivory towers, but they live in million-dollar mansions.
The presidents of five City University of New York colleges and the dean of the university’s law school get free housing in lavish homes in top-notch neighborhoods.
Another 15 CUNY presidents and deans receive monthly $5,000 housing allowances, enough collectively to cover a year’s tuition for nearly 200 students.
Matthew Goldstein, the CUNY chancellor, earns $450,000 and gets an extra $90,000 a year for housing, giving him the highest allowance in the nation along with the new State University of New York chancellor and a college administrator in Kentucky.
The honchos continue to receive the housing and allowances as students are being asked to pay higher tuition this year because of the state’s budget crisis. Tuition at CUNY’s four-year schools went up by $600 to $4,600 a year.
Dick Dadey, executive director of watchdog group Citizens Union, called the housing “quite a significant perk” that “becomes increasing difficult to defend” given the economy.
The president of Queens College, James Muyskens, and CUNY Law School dean Michelle Anderson, live in the tony Douglas Manor enclave that was once home to tennis great John McEnroe. Muysken’s house is about seven miles from campus.
The president of Brooklyn College lives in a 1918 neoclassical home in the borough’s Prospect Heights South historic district, is valued at $1.6 million and is two miles from the college.
The Medgar Evers College president lives in a prewar co-op across from the Brooklyn Museum, about a mile from the Brooklyn campus. The head of the College of Staten Island lives on tony Todt Hill about three miles from his campus, and the president of Lehman College in The Bronx lives in leafy Riverdale, three miles from Lehman.
The perks don’t stop at the city line.
The SUNY board of trustees last week authorized a $90,000 a year housing allowance for chancellor Nancy Zimpher, who earns $490,000 and also gets an apartment in the university’s Albany headquarters plus a car and driver.
Each SUNY president gets either a free house or a housing allowance that ranges from $3,500 to $5,500.
CUNY defends the housing, saying its leaders are on call day and night for university business, plus they host alumni, business and community leaders in their homes.