Hubris: n. Overbearing pride or presumption: Arrogance. The American Heritage Dictionary.
A glaring Kansas example: University of Kansas athletic director, Lew Perkins.
As reported in Monday’s Register, Perkins billed the KU athletic department more than $150,000 for 22 flights on university-owned and leased planes from July 2000 to May 2010. Perkins even took a jet from Lawrence to Columbia, Mo. at a cost of $1,983 and then spent another $380 on ground transportation to go to a KU-MU basketball game.
When confronted with these astounding figures, Perkins told a Kansas City Star reporter:
“In my world, time is very important. I consider my time very valuable. That’s one of the reasons why we have planes, to help us get places quicker.”
My, my.
It is 167 miles from Lawrence to Columbia. Even if Perkins had a helicopter pick him up at his house, deliver him to an airport where his KU jet was waiting with engine running at take-off level, and even if the Columbia airport were smack dab up against the basketball stadium there — which it isn’t — he couldn’t have saved an hour of travel time over riding on the bus with Bill Self and the team at no additional cost at all.
So what did Perkins do with the hour he saved that was worth $2,363 to the KU athletic department? He went to a basketball game, that’s what.
Now, truth be told, neither Self nor anyone else would have missed Perkins if he had had stayed in Lawrence and worked on his department budget looking for ways to cut unnecessary expenses, which would have been a much better use of his oh-so-valuable time.
Speaking of which, the Star reporter added to his story by noting that Perkins earned $4.4 million last year in addition to taking 22 private flights at a cost of $107,000.
With earnings of $84,615.39 every week — about twice the annual income of the average Kansas family — it is no wonder that Perkins is so impressed with himself. His time is, by any measure, very valuable. And very, very expensive to the University of Kansas athletic department.
Need it be necessary to point out that every time he takes a plane and rents a top-of-the-line car — that’s how very important people travel, you know — his time costs KU that much more. In some cases, the Star reported, he flew to places such as Wichita, Hutchinson and Lincoln which were within two or three hours of Lawrence by car.
The unanswered questions in this ugly example of extravagant waste are how Perkins can persuade himself that throwing money away as though it were peanut hulls makes him more valuable to KU — and why the powers that be on Mt. Oread tolerate his galling arrogance.
His departure next spring is none too soon.
— Emerson Lynn, jr.
