Bruce Benson profile

The Rocky

Published January 31, 2008 at 1:13 p.m.
Updated January 31, 2008 at 1:13 p.m.

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Bruce Benson, 69, Lone finalist for president of the University of Colorado

Education: Bachelor's degree from CU-Boulder.

Current: President and owner of Benson Mineral Group, an oil and gas company.

* Co-chair of Gov. Bill Ritter's P-20 Education Coordinating Council.

* Member of the board of CU's Center of the American West, a cross-discipline organization that produces speeches, conferences and books.

Chair of the Denver Public Schools Foundation

Past: Republican candidate for governor in 1994, lost to incumbent Gov. Roy Romer.

* Board chairman of the Metropolitan State College of Denver until replaced by Ritter in 2007.

* Chair of former Gov. Bill Owens' Blue Ribbon Panel on Higher Education for the 21st Century.

* Chair of the Colorado Commission on Higher Education.

* Member of Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper's Infrastructure Priorities Task Force, which recommended a property tax increase.

* Supported Refs C and D for a five-year time-out on the tax-collecting restrictions of the Tabor Amendment.

* Member of board of the CU Foundation, 1990-1996; chair of fund drive for CU's earth sciences building, which was named after him after he donated $3 million for it; also donated $3 million for an endowed chair in petroleum geology.

* Awarded CU's University Medal by regents in 1999.

He is married to Marcy Benson; with his first wife, Nancy Benson, he had three children: Jim, David, and Ann.

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