By Tom Jackson
tjackson@uga.edu
President Michael F. Adams earlier this month announced a renewed contract for Vince Dooley,
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Vince Dooley
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director of athletics, through Dec. 31, 2003. Dooley’s current contract was to have expired June 30; the new agreement and pay raise are effective retroactively to Jan. 1. In accepting the agreement, Dooley said it will be his final contract as UGA athletics director.
In a letter to Dooley outlining the agreement reached in a meeting between the two, Adams wrote, “I believe this new agreement will be of benefit to our athletics program and will allow you to conclude your long and productive service to the university with the same level of commitment and success you have demonstrated over the past 37 years. I am especially pleased that you will be close at hand for the next three football seasons as Coach Richt makes his transition in his new leadership role.”
“I appreciate Dr. Adams’s extending my contract for two and a half years through Dec. 2003, including three football seasons, which is very important to me,” Dooley says.
Terms of the new agreement are $200,000 annual base salary, $13,500 bonus for football team performance (guaranteed for first year), $85,000 radio-TV agreement, and a 5 percent raise ($14,925) effective Jan. 1 for a total of $313,425 for the first year of the contract.
Raises in the second and third years are to be consistent with the normal pattern for state employees. Attorneys for the university and Dooley will prepare a contract to formalize the agreement.
Dooley’s impact on collegiate athletics across the country has brought him and the university national recognition. Since he became athletic director in 1979, UGA teams have won 15 national championships, 64 SEC team championships and numerous individual national titles in both men’s and women’s sports. He has overseen more than $90 million in athletic-facility construction and improvements.
Under his leadership, more than 90 UGA student-athletes have been named first-team Academic All-American, more than 30 have received NCAA PostGraduate Scholarships, and more than $250,000 has been awarded to the university’s general scholarship fund through performances by UGA student-athletes.
Dooley is a past president of the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics and of the American Football Coaches Association. He is also a past chairman of the NCAA Football Rules Committee (1994–99), the NCAA Recruiting Committee, and the Division 1-A athletic directors. He is presently serving on the Honors Court of the National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame and is also currently a member of the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year selection committee. |
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