MU graduate fills chair endowed by Lay

The position has been vacant since it was created.

By Andrew Denney

Published April 23, 2008

The Kenneth L. Lay Chair in Economics, named for the MU graduate and former chief of the defunct Enron Corp., was filled Monday after remaining unoccupied for nearly nine years.

Economics professor Joseph Haslag is the first to occupy the position. Michael O'Brien, dean of the College of Arts and Science, said Haslag was the first candidate from MU offered the job.

Under the new title, Haslag will receive an annual salary of $150,000 and receive $20,000 each year for research purposes.

Haslag said he was informed of his appointment to the position in February.

"It's a nice feeling to be liked by your university," Haslag said.

He said he plans to invest a portion of his research funding in the economics department to "provide social goods."

O'Brien said four candidates from other institutions were offered the position, but counteroffers from their home institutions proved more appealing.

"They would go back to their home institutions, who would match and outmatch our offer," O'Brien said.

Before Haslag's appointment to the chair, the position had been vacant since its creation in 1999. Lay gave MU $1.1 million to fund the chair.

Lay was indicted for conspiracy and fraud in 2004 and was charged with six counts of conspiracy and fraud and four counts of bank fraud in May 2006 after trading scandals involving the Enron Corp. were revealed. He was scheduled for sentencing in October of that year, but he died in July while vacationing with his family.

In a previous report, O'Brien said MU is not permitted to change the name of the position. He said once an endowed seat has been established, the name can be changed only at the donor's behest.

According to an MU news release, when Lay gave the money to MU, he signed an agreement stating that the money was an "irrevocable gift" to the university. But in September 2005, Lay asked Chancellor Brady Deaton to donate the money from the endowment to several Hurricane Katrina relief efforts in the Houston area.

Soon thereafter, the UM system general council, in cooperation with the Missouri attorney general's office, determined that there were legal concerns in returning the gift.

In February 2006, the release states, representatives from the general council met with representatives from a Texas-based trustee that oversaw Lay's assets, who said the money from the endowment would be used to pay Lay's legal bills from the Enron case.

According to the release, the trustee made no mention of using the funds for relief efforts.

Since his death, charges against Lay were officially dropped.

O'Brien said he didn't think the name attached to the position dissuaded candidates from taking the job. He said the university wouldn't "have gotten as close" as it did to finding someone to fill the seat if the name had.

"I never saw it as a drawback," O'Brien said.

Haslag said he wasn't very knowledgeable about Enron or the nature of its downfall.

"It's not part of an area I do research in," Haslag said. "What the university offered me was in recognition of my scholarly research in the past."

Haslag has been a member of the MU faculty since 2000. He also received his bachelor's and master's degrees from MU in 1982 and 1984 respectively.