In announcing a five-year contract extension for University of Massachusetts President William Bulger, UMass Board of Trustees Chairwoman Grace Fey stated, “We are fortunate to have Bill Bulger as our president.” The Mass Media agrees with Ms. Fey.

While the opinions of our editors were hardly unanimous, the consensus is that given the current economic state of the state, who better than Bulger. Our president spent 35 years on Beacon Hill, 17 of those as president of the state senate, and now represents the interests of the state university system during the legislative in fighting that goes on as the budget pie is sliced up. The times call for a heavyweight, not a featherweight.

During Bulger’s presidency, appropriations for the state universities rose from $354 million in 1996 to $484 million for fiscal year 2001. The Chronicle of Higher Education called it “the largest growth for a state institution anywhere in the country.” One gets the sense that Bulger will fight to protect and continue that growth.

In a sense, Bulger is our lobbyist, competing with a myriad of special interests group seeking their piece of that afore mentioned budget pie. Two-thirds of the state budget is fixed and can’t be cut. Of the other one-third, public higher education appears to be an obvious target, given the fact that revenue can be raised through other sources (read: tuition and fee increases) during a time of fiscal crises.

The recent tuition increase was the first of the Bulger era. Affordable public higher education appears to be a genuine goal of his administration. For example, many state agencies annually raise their costs and then point to inflation as the culprit. Bulger had been able to hold the line against inflation. Those of us with a “bottom-line” mentality appreciate his efforts.

Empty political rhetoric, which always seems to accompany the issue of public education (who ever came out against better public education in an election year?) won’t appropriately serve the needs of UMass Boston right now. What is needed now is some quiet political arm-twisting and a strong presence in those “smoke-filled, back rooms,” where decisions are made and deals are cut.

The extension, which will keep Bulger in office through July 1, 2007, does not include a raise. He’ll have to continue to scrape by on $309,000 a year. But if he’s able to successfully use his political savvy to save many times that amount in budget cuts to the state universities, than it’s money well spent.

While one can’t picture President Bulger standing in front of the state house with a bullhorn, his behind the scenes style of quiet but persistent persuasion has proved to be effective. And effective leadership is what we’re going to need to weather the tough times.