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Michael Eicher, one of UCLA’s top officials who oversaw the decade-long, $3 billion fundraising initiative Campaign UCLA, is leaving the university for a position at Johns Hopkins University, officials said Wednesday.

Eicher, the vice chancellor of external affairs, was chiefly responsible for raising funds and managing the university’s relationship with external entities, such as local government, community members and alumni. His last day will be July 14.

At Johns Hopkins, he will be the vice president for Development and Alumni Relations, in which he will raise funds both for the university and Johns Hopkins’ medical system, which includes three hospitals and is a separate entity from the university.

“Now’s the right time for me to take a little risk and to have an adventure,” said Eicher, who had been at UCLA for 20 years, in an interview.

Eicher’s departure to the Maryland private university marks the second time this year that a high-ranking UCLA administrator has left for a top post at another university.

Soncia Lilly, a former assistant vice chancellor for student affairs, left UCLA in April to be dean of students at the University of Texas at Austin, a public school.

University of California leaders, including President Robert Dynes and UCLA Chancellor Albert Carnesale, have consistently expressed worries about preventing top administrators from leaving to private schools in an era of decreasing state funding.

Asked if he would consider his move a confirmation of those fears, Eicher said he didn’t because “that implies things that weren’t part of my decision.”

Eicher has been at UCLA since 1986, when he started at UCLA Health Sciences Development. He was appointed associate vice chancellor for development in 1996 and vice chancellor of external affairs in 1999.

He said in a letter to colleagues that he felt it was the right time to leave “in large measure because external affairs is strong and well-positioned to continue to move forward under new leadership.”

His headline project for the last 10 years has been Campaign UCLA, which ended in December and was the largest fundraising campaign in higher education history.

Carnesale said in a statement that Eicher has “played a major role in ensuring that UCLA continues to compete successfully with other top-tier research universities.”

In the 2004-2005 fiscal year, Eicher made $233,500.08 in base salary, the 40th highest base salary at UCLA and the eighth highest salary for UCLA employees not associated with the health sciences.

Dennis O’Shea, a spokesman for Johns Hopkins, said Eicher’s new job is slightly different than similar fundraising positions at other universities because Eicher will be managing the collective fundraising for two entirely separate corporations – the university and Johns Hopkins Medicine.

Johns Hopkins is currently in the middle of a large-scale fundraising campaign of its own – “Johns Hopkins: Knowledge for the World” – and has raised more than its goal of $2 billion to date. It is scheduled to continue through 2007.

While O’Shea said the middle of a campaign is a strange time to hire someone new, he said Eicher’s experience was “very impressive” and that he would be an able leader of Johns Hopkins’ fundraising efforts.

“I think our president and our senior leadership have every confidence” in Eicher’s ability to pick up Johns Hopkins’ current campaign, O’Shea said.

UCLA spokesman Lawrence Lokman said Carnesale and other administrators would be deciding on an interim solution for the position at UCLA in the coming weeks, but declined to give specifics. Lokman said there were also “other issues” to sort out, including who will replace Carnesale when he steps down June 30.