By Kelly Heyboer/ The Star-Ledger

NEW BRUNSWICK — Once the bills for consultants, meals, meetings and other expenses were added up, the price tag for Rutgers University’s latest presidential search came in at $226,532, campus officials said.

Robert L. Barchi
Robert L. Barchi, the former president of Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, is set to take over as president of Rutgers University.
The state university spent more than six months looking for a new leader before selecting former Thomas Jefferson University president Robert Barchi this spring.
Campus officials said the cost of the search was a relative bargain compared with Rutgers’ last presidential search a decade ago, which cost nearly $50,000 more.

But the university still spent lavishly to wine and dine prospective candidates, according to a Star-Ledger review of nearly 300 pages of receipts obtained through the Open Public Records Act. The bills include limo rides, hotel stays and pricey dinners, including a $1,200 meal for one finalist and members of the board of governors at the Peacock Inn in Princeton that included $216 worth of wine and liquor.

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