Employee Assembly Meeting
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
12:15 — 1:30 p.m.
316 Day Hall
Draft Minutes

I. Call to Order — EA luncheon meeting with Mary Opperman

D. Goss called the meeting to order, and said that the purpose of today’s luncheon was to have a general discussion with Mary Opperman.

Bright Horizons Child Care Center
It is conceptual design right now. It goes to the internal approval group next week, then it will go to the Board of Trustees for the conceptual design approval. Once the conceptual approvals have been given we will move ahead with the community to get the necessary license to build and we hope to open the center in 2008.

It is a beautiful building that will be located in the gateway area, which will be one of the buildings that you will see first coming into Cornell via north campus next to the A lot parking area. It has green standards that we need to meet.

Unfortunately, at the same time, as you have probably already read in the newspapers, Human Ecology has announced their decision to close its Early Childcare Center here on campus. There was not enough academic need or space in the college to keep it open. It will be open however until the new childcare center opens. Many alumni are upset at this news. The important message to pass on is this center closing has no connection with the new childcare centers opening. We had proposed the new center prior to Human Ecology deciding to close their center. Every effort was made to keep the center open, but it is just not going to work out.

Steve Golding and Mary Opperman have been considering a second childcare center at the East Hill Plaza area once the new office complex is built.

D. Goss asked about incorporating childcare centers into buildings? Mary said that it would be difficult to do that due to the many state mandated childcare center regulations that have to be followed. It was thought that possibly we could use some space as drop-off space or vacation space for school-aged kids.

Aetna Health Insurance Changes
Mary shared with the group that the plan has had a lot of physicians leaving the network lately. On the endowed side, we have Health Now and Aetna, and within Aetna there are two choices: the 80/20 plan and the PPO. Our employee population is about half and half right now between Health Now and Aetna plans. Ithaca College has dropped the Health Now plan and now only has Aetna. One of the weird things about the employer sponsored health plan is that employers are not allowed to know the rates that are paid. Currently, Health Now is paying more than the Aetna Plan. As a result, two notable physicians have dropped out of the Aetna plan, they are Dr. Strominger and OBGYN. What that means is you can still go to these physicians and be covered but it means you are considered “out of network”, instead of “in-network”, and consequently the payment is less. We are caught in the middle of this problem. The whole Aetna plan will come up for review again in March, so there will be more to report after that. Ithaca is a remote area, and with no expected population increase, doctors that are here need to be sure they are still making money so their offices can survive.

Additionally, Cayuga Medical Center just opened their new emergency room. The Cardio Vascular Intensive Care unit is a fantastic state of the art facility. We are very lucky to have this facility in Ithaca.

Communications Committee
H. Hall reported that they had a Communications Committee meeting and after much discussion, the committee has decided to go forward with the original plan, similar to the Chili Chats and will call it Leadership Luncheons.

H. Hall said they talked about the three questions, and think it would be best go with the original questions with a slight revision to the second one. “What are the biggest obstacles you face when approving vacation time for your staff?” It is likely they will move the timeline to get a definite ending out further in the spring. So the first lunch would be held at Geneva March 17, the second will be breakfast on April 10, at Appel Commons, and the third event will be April 30 or May 1 at Willard Straight Hall.

P. Korolov added they are still putting together the format. Tentatively, Mary will do an introduction of 5 minutes or so to start, then we will take some time to review our findings and data from the Chili Chats, then will have a long question and answer session to conclude. The idea is to get lots of feedback from them.

Mary wanted to know if we should take up the president’s offer to have another open forum. Maybe we could do a “Town Hall” event in mid-to late May. In doing this we will have different feedback coming out of the questions and answer session. D. Goss said she thought it was a great idea, and she could present the results to the senior staff in summer and to the Presidents Council in the fall.

Mary asked that the Communications group get a budget together and give to her and President Skorton for review.

D. Goss asked Mary how to come up with a way to specifically target managers and supervisors to attend these events? Donna asked Mary what her feelings about sending a DDD letter were? Mary thought it was not the best thing to rely on. Mary suggested they openly publicize it in the Paw Print and with PawPrint Flash, and that she will send it out to her electronic HR list.

II. Open Forum

D. Stein asked a question of how many more buildings are planned for East Hill Plaza. Mary said there are two more buildings planned, the generic office building and one other primarily for technology. There will be hundreds more people located there, and it will be a totally separate campus except there will be no teaching going on.

The long-term goal is to get Cornell staff out of the Thornwood Road location so it can be rented to small businesses, as it should truly be used as a technology park.

Human Resources staff had planned to move to the new East Hill Building but because of the open floor plan it was decided there wouldn’t be enough privacy. They tried to get the building built to our specs, but it couldn’t be done, so HR offices will not be moving after all.

I. Mahler asked a question regarding job hunting. Is there actually a person to talk to about this if you are already on staff? Mary said there is a program called “Quest” that can help an employee transfer within Cornell. If they are a CU employee and in good standing they may participate in this program. If they are a Cornell employee spouse, or not already employed here, then Employment Services can help them.

III. Adjournment

The meeting was adjourned at 1:30 p.m.