Employee Assembly Meeting
Wednesday, April 4, 2007
12:15 — 1:30 p.m.
316 Day Hall
DRAFT Minutes

I. Call to Order (D. Goss)

D. Goss called the meeting to order at 12:20 p.m.

Due to President Skorton and Mary Opperman attending, the order of the agenda was changed significantly.

VI. Approval of Minutes — 12/6/06 (D. Goss)

D. Goss asked if there were any amendments that needed to be made to the minutes. There were two amendments made by the membership.

P. Mahoney made a motion to approve the minutes as amended. P. Korolov seconded. The minutes were approved as amended.

P. Mahoney then commented on the attendance sheet. D. Goss asked the membership to look over the attendance as we are trying to keep this section updated and accurate. Please let Amy know if you have any corrections on your attendance.

V. Trustee’s Report (M. Esposito)

M. Esposito reported that the executive committee of the Board of Trustees will be meeting next week in NYC. Michael will not be attending.

The Student Trustee election is going on now. There are 13 candidates vying for one seat. It will now be one grad and one undergrad representing the students for the next four years.

The GPSA presented a report to the Board of Trustees called the Graduate Community Initiative which generated a lot of interest.

VIII. Old Business (part 1)

f. Code of Conduct Questions/Discussion R3 (L. Lawrence)
There was some discussion regarding the R3 resolution of the Code of Conduct. It was decided that some edits need to be made to the resolution. Mary said she understood the message, but suggested it be written differently so the point is not lost by the way its written. She also urged the EA to send the final version in soon. President Skorton asked about the time frame, and said that he would wait to act until he gets input from all constituents.

III. Business of the Day — President Skorton and VP Mary Opperman, Update from the President-Open Discussion

a. Introduction of New EA Members
D. Goss introduced the three new EA members to President Skorton. President Skorton welcomed the new members.

b. President Skorton’s Important Issues
1. President Skorton said that in addition to meeting with the EA and the Expanded Group of staff, he has been meeting with the SA, the GPSA, the GPSA at Weill Medical, the faculty leadership and the undergrads. He said he hopes to do even more next year.

3. The Campus Code is very important to him because of what it as and that it involves everybody. He is impressed with the overall shared government at the University. The task force in faculty and staff is healthy and ready to discuss the shared governance.

4. He has realized how important taking vacation and sick time is because people need to take care of themselves. He has been thinking a lot about this since hearing the results from the Chili Chat. He recognizes faculty and staff are exhausted, and hopes that everyone will have the opportunity to take a break over the summer.

5. Fundraising has been very large here at campus. President Skorton probably spends 30% of time on this. He has been traveling 7–8 days per month. He is trying to cut down on the amount of time he is out of town. 6. Another thing that President Skorton has been working on is finding ways for the Ithaca, New York City and Geneva campuses to work more smoothly together

c. Climate Neutrality
Mary Opperman asked President Skorton to talk about the Climate Neutrality Agreement. He explained that this is a national effort to get people to reduce global warming. It is partially driven by a student group called Kyoto Now. Cornell had a group of faculty, staff and students discuss this for 11 days. The first part is to strive for carbon neutrality by 2050, but there are other parts to it that go beyond carbon neutrality. It is unknown how it will affect us, but by early fall we will have a better idea. There is a lot of information on the web site. It will be a massive undertaking, but we will go slowly. Staff will be in a leadership role.

d. Local Radio Show
L. Lawrence asked the President about his radio show. President Skorton explained he had a public radio show in Iowa, so he suggested starting a talk radio show here also. Tommy Bruce and others set up this show with President Skorton, the President of IC and the President of TC3. The phone calls and emails were overwhelming. They have decided to do this every 6 weeks or so, on different topics. Before the SUNY Chancellor John Ryan announced his resignation, he agreed to do this statewide. President Skorton is waiting for new leadership before he can continue with this.

e. Relationship with the Board of Trustees
L. Lawrence asked the President about his relationship with the BoT. President Skorton responded that it couldn’t be better. They are a very supportive, open and straightforward group. President Skorton admires their tremendous loyalty and generosity to Cornell.

VIII. Old Business cont. (part 2)

b. Climate Neutrality Guest Update (D. Goss)
D. Goss reported that she and Peter met with Ethan Rainwater and Dean Koyanagi, from the Sustainability Office, about what the SA and the GPSA have done regarding the Climate Neutrality Agreement and sustainability. Donna reported that April 16th is Earth Day, and there will be special forums held on campus during that week. Donna said that the information on this is on the web, that Dennis would have an article in Pawprint, and that she would forward any additional information she receives to the membership.

II. Call for Late Additions to the Agenda

The New Student Book Reading Project was added to the agenda by L. Lawrence.

VIII. Old Business cont. (part 3)

a. Resolution/CJC Report (T. Jacobs)
D. Goss asked T. Jacobs if she received enough information to finish this resolution. Torrey confirmed that she had, and thanked Hazel for her help in writing it.

c. EMS Guest Update (D. Goss)
D. Goss said this was a good item to keep on the list of agenda items for a future meeting, but that we may not get to this by the of the term.

d. Alternate Location for Meeting Discussion
D. Goss said this item has been discussed before to hold EA meetings at different locations on campus to include different units and colleges to attend our meetings. L. Lawrence suggested we begin a pilot program. Donna would like to table this discussion for today, but keep it on the list of agenda items for a future meeting.

e. Approval of 2007 —08 EA meeting calendar (A. O’Donnell)
P. Mahoney motioned to approve the meeting schedule. L. Lawrence seconded this motion. The motion to approve the meeting schedule for next term passed.

g. Inclement Weather Committee (P. Mahoney)
P. Mahoney said they will be meeting Monday 4/9 for the first time in the afternoon. P. Mahoney will share the results from that meeting. L. Lawrence asked for a quick explanation of this for new members, and Pat gave a brief overview of the situation around the university closing on February 14th.

h. EA Election Expense - Final Budget Submission (P. Mahoney)
P. Mahoney explained the latest revisions, including adding $3,000 to cover EA and Employee Elected Trustee elections. She specifically noted the new total for the budget is $15,000. L. Lawrence made a motion to approve the budget. P. Korolov seconded. The budget passed. Pat will work with Ari to finalize this into a resolution.

VII. New Business

a. Staff Graduation Bios (D. Goss)
D. Goss said that Cheryl McGraw had contacted her and she is looking for volunteers to write bios for the staff participating in the Staff Graduation Reception next month. Cheryl will get these bios to us in the next week or two. All EA members volunteered to help write the bios.

b. Outside Elections Committee (D. Goss)
Many ideas came from this discussion; form an ad hoc committee made up of past EA members, have a campaign that would last all year, discuss this with the expanded staff group to get their ideas, EA members could take turns bringing guests to meetings, using Pawprint more. L. Lawrence thought instead of an Ad Hoc Committee maybe the Education and/or Communications Committee could work on this initially.

D. Stein is concerned that this year Andri was the chair of IOC and up for re-election at the same time. Additionally, D. Goss was only a member on the Executive Committee not up for re-election. We need to find ways to avoid this awkward situation in the future. Dennis offered to help form a group of outside individuals, as they would be unbiased.

L. Lawrence requested to extend the meeting 5 more minutes.

K. Howell said she would be willing to serve on committees on an “as needed” basis.

D. Goss said there is no set deadline or timeline, but we need to get some ideas together for some resolution by the end of the year.

c. Sabbatic Leave for Staff (D. Goss)
Due to time constraints, this item was tabled until the next meeting.

d. Mortgage Benefit Program (D. Goss)
Due to time constraints, this item was also tabled until the next meeting.

IX. Committee Reports

All committee reports were suspended due to time constraints.

X. Open Forum

The open forum was also suspended due to time constraints.

II. Late Addition to the Agenda — Follow up

L. Lawrence distributed copies of “The Pickup” which is the next freshmen book project. He met with Vice Provost Michelle Moody-Adams recently, and she agreed to provide copies to all the voting members of the Employee Assembly and their supporting staff members.

XI. Adjournment

P. Mahoney motioned to adjourn. P. Korolov seconded this motion. The meeting was adjourned at 1:42 p.m.