SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The University of California Board of Regents is boosting the six-figure salaries of chancellors in the system by as much as 20 percent, part of an effort regents say is aimed at bringing the salaries in line with their counterparts.

The raises, granted at Thursday’s board meeting, are the first step in a three-year plan to compete with top research institutions across the country, the Los Angeles Times reported.

UC President Janet Napolitano said UC chancellors run some of the best schools in the nation, but surveys show they earn about $90,000 a year less than top officials at campuses belonging to the research-oriented Association of American Universities.

“It is my strong belief that we need to pay our chancellors within a competitive range,” she said.

Regents reset the salaries of their three lowest paid chancellors — at the Santa Cruz, Merced and Riverside campuses — at $383,160, marking 20 percent raises for George Blumenthal at Santa Cruz and Dorothy Leland at Merced. At the Santa Barbara campus, Chancellor Henry Yang also received a 20 percent raise, to $389,340.

The regents also voted to appoint Howard Gillman permanent chancellor of UC Irvine and to pay him $485,000 a year.

Gillman, who has been interim chancellor since June, will make $93,000 more than his predecessor, who left to run Ohio State University.

The raises are also an attempt to adjust a pay structure that regents say has some veteran administrators making substantially less than others who were recently hired.

Currently, UC’s highest-paid chancellor is Sam Hawgood, who was hired in July at a salary of $750,000 a year at UC San Francisco. UCLA chancellor Gene Block makes $428,480.

Chancellor salaries have been a sensitive subject with students and other UC employees.

“At a time when resources are needed to prevent tuition hikes and perform much-needed safety maintenance, huge raises for UC’s highest-paid executives sends the wrong message about UC’s priorities to the public we are here to serve,” said Todd Stenhouse, a spokesman for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represents campus custodians, medical technicians and others.