MSU has recently made significant progress in advancing its research and reputation. In 1970, it had few nationally recognized programs and subsequently missed many opportunities to promote or retain excellence. A generation ago political intrusions on academic quality afflicted Montana Hall, but leadership, entrepreneurship, location, and technology now trump.

Today MSU is far more alert to positive potentials and more ambitious to achieve them. It is a more confident institution and can no longer be dismissed as a mere cow college in a hick town. Perhaps soon even its athletic program will be reformed and reward character and academic potential, offering Montana kids the scholarship inducements now used to recruit problematic players from out of state. Alas, a new problem has arisen: faculty hiring and retention are made more difficult by Bozeman’s high housing prices.

MSU is now among America’s top 100 research universities. Respected scholars, including Nobel Prize winners and E.O. Wilson, likely the world’s most prominent biologist, enjoy visiting. Enticing top faculty to consider joining MSU is not a ridiculous dream but rather a clear reality. This is a great place to live and raise a family -- if one can afford it.

Clearly, excellent professors are required to build a good university. If they are to live here, they must have the financial means to achieve a satisfactory life. This, of course, includes the ability to own a comfortable home near campus.

But not all good things go together. Quality of life implies high costs of living. Bozeman is nationally recognized as an increasingly attractive place to live. It’s compellingly obvious that Bozeman’s population is booming. Consequently, housing prices have risen dramatically.

Even if faculty salaries kept pace with inflation, and only a few departments have managed this, most junior faculty are priced out of the market. This severely constrains opportunities to attract and retain highly promising candidates.

The Bozeman Daily Chronicle recently reported: “High Cost of Living Takes Toll on MSU.” Shannon Taylor, chairman of the Faculty Council, was quoted: “Some faculty members are leaving MSU because it’s too tough to make it even on a professor’s salary.” The article then mentioned two who made $41,000 leaving because they could not afford to live in Bozeman.

This gave me pause, for at first blush $41,000 seems at least an adequate sum. Curious, I plugged in some numbers. I’ve spoken with former MSU colleagues who also arrived around 1970. Our average salaries then were about $11,000 and a nice single-family home sold for $35-$40,000. The equivalent today would be a salary of about $55,000 and home prices around $175-$200,000. The problem is, a comparable house now sells for around $285,000. Instead of three-and-a-half times annual salary, it now takes seven times.

Excellent professors have many opportunities to move. If we are to hire and retain high-quality faculty, they must be well compensated. Compensation, of course, includes our high quality of life, not only dollars. Purdue is an excellent school, but who would choose West Lafayette over Bozeman? No one I know.

Consider this solution. MSU owns over 1750 acres of ag land near campus, 952 of which are contiguous. Recognize this land is primarily for ag research. Given equal land quality, barley doesn’t care where it grows nor cows where they graze. Faculty, in contrast, care a great deal where they live. And so should we, for propinquity fosters community

This offers an opportunity to aid ag research while alleviating the housing crunch. This requires institutional entrepreneurship.

Consider allocating some of this MSU land for building lots faculty can purchase at a price equal to ten times that of comparable quality ag land, near Whitehall for example. Thus, if 100 of the 1750 acres were taken for faculty housing, some 400 nice homesites at far below market rates, it would be replaced by 1000 acres for ag research.

I’m intentionally ignoring problems: legal complexities, legacy skepticism from land deals a generation ago, and potential opportunistic land flipping by faculty. In times of change, leaders resolve problems. Since it is impossible to increase starting salaries by 50 percent, this may be one way to deal with the constraints of high housing costs.