UF President Bernie Machen got his Christmas present a little early this year, and it has five zeros.
At a meeting Friday morning, UF's Board of Trustees approved performance bonuses for Machen totaling almost ,300,000.
The bonuses secure his spot as the highest paid university president in Florida. Machen is also the sixth-highest paid president of a public university in the nation.
Machen makes more than ,700,000 a year, which is more than Gov. Charlie Crist's salary.
But not every trustee wanted to boost Machen's pay.
The board approved Machen's bonus by a 12-1 vote.
Trustee Al Warrington, chairman of the board's Committee on Finance and Facilities, was the only trustee who voted against Machen's bonus.
After the meeting, Warrington said he wouldn't talk about the reasons behind his vote, only revealing that it had to do with new information about "administration."
He said he would be ready to discuss the issue further in a few weeks after he does more research on "his thesis."
Machen said he didn't know why Warrington voted against the bonus.
"I don't know what he's doing or why," Machen said. "Today was the first I'd heard about it."
