Employee Assembly Meeting
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
12:15—1:30 p.m.
316 Day Hall
Minutes

I. Call to Order

B. Cornell called the meeting to order at 12:18pm.

II. Call for Late Additions to the Agenda

B. Cornell called for late additions to the agenda. He added a winter retreat recap to the agenda.

III. Report from Chair

B. Cornell thanked the members for all of their hard work. They recently awarded another George Peter Award and held a Childcare forum presentation over at the Johnson Museum.

IV. Report from Employee Trustee

M. Esposito was unable to attend the meeting.

V. Report from UA representative

B. Liddick read a letter from R. Orme highlighting the recent events surrounding the revisions of the Campus Code of Conduct, including the President’s response and the UA’s reaction to this. The CJC, UA and President Skorton have since met, to clarify the situation and decide how to best approach the revisions, and these meeting have been quite productive.

VI. Business of the Day � Mary Opperman attending

� 1) The childcare facility and family services

M. Opperman said the childcare facility is scheduled to be open in August. In April, there will be open forums for faculty and staff and, in March, there will be open forums for graduate students. The UA’s Childcare Committee is vetting issues, such as those about enrollment priorities, and it’s important that the staff voice be heard on that committee.

K. Howell said 60 people attended the February 6th Johnson Museum EA meeting, so hopefully this will influence the extent to which staff voice their opinions in these decisions. There will be an EA News & Views article about the meeting for employees who might have questions.

� 2) Letters for EA Volunteers’ Supervisors

M. Opperman said that, a few years ago, she sent letters encouraging EA members’ supervisors to be as flexible as possible with requests from EA members to attend meetings and functions, because of the importance of their contributions. She said she would be happy to do this again.

B. Cornell said a lot of members have given feedback saying they’ve been feeling pressure from their supervisors; it might be a misunderstanding but that’s how some people feel.

M. Opperman asked the assembly for a list of which members wanted letters sent to their supervisors, since some EA members indicated a letter to their supervisors was not necessary.

In response to K. Howell’s question asking if this letter would be kept on file to use year after year, B. Liddick said yes, since newly elected members may want to use this letter as well.

In response to M. Opperman’s statement that, while she’s happy to send the letter, people should be speaking to their supervisor before they run since not every job is conducive to allowing employees to leave for extended periods of time, P. Mahoney’s said it’s important that they be proactive about conveying to potential candidates the extent of the time commitment required.

� 3) Release time policy document that Chet et. al. drafted

M. Opperman said the business officers were reluctant to provide mandated employee release time, even though they think highly of volunteering, taking classes and participating. It feels like an unfunded mandate to them. The EA needed to clarify exactly what they wanted to make it easier for her to make her case. She needs to know whether they want to extend release time beyond wellness and what this would entail (volunteering, time to take classes, etc).

In response to B. McKinney’s suggestion that they put together guidelines, instead of a mandated policy, to encourage reluctant units and provide guidance for those units that needed help with implementation, M. Opperman said this could work but they still needed to define the activities for which employees should receive release time. The leadership would not give employees 90 minutes of paid free time to do whatever they wanted. They also couldn’t sanction activities that advance one area over another (for example, volunteer activities that benefit schools but not hospitals) and they should consider how such a policy could increase university costs at the expense of families paying tuition. They have to be fair and balanced in thinking about this.

There was a brief discussion about the EA making time to discuss the NCAA’s 10-year review. Even though this minimally impacts employees, they still wanted to hear input from employees. The EA has arranged to take 20 minutes to discuss this at their March 5th meeting and M. Opperman said she would reexamine her schedule to see if she could attend.

There was brief discussion about the nature of the letter being sent to supervisors. I. Mahler said the message would be more effectively conveyed if they sent letters of appreciation rather than letters ordering supervisors to release them. L. Lawrence said, a few years ago, they had a recognition lunch for supervisors to thank them for their flexibility; they should do this again. M. Opperman said this would be a good idea, but an appreciative letter from the President pre-election would be a great way to send the message early and get across his point of shared governance. A letter could effectively convey what the EA does, the importance of their contribution and an estimated time commitment. A. Epstein said there was an existing letter they could use, but M. Opperman said a letter from the President would have more punch.

M. Opperman said she thought the UA behaved very professionally in their discussions about the President’s response to the revised campus code given their strong feelings about it. She reviewed what happened at the UA meeting upon request from J. Magura.

VII. Approval of Minutes

� a. January 2, 2008 Minutes

B. Cornell asked everyone to review the January 2, 2008 minutes. P. Mahoney moved to approve the minutes as submitted. L. Lawrence seconded the motion. The minutes were approved.

� b. January 16, 2008 Minutes

B. Cornell asked everyone to review the January 16, 2008 minutes. K. Howell moved to approve the minutes as submitted. P. Mahoney seconded the motion. The minutes were approved.

VIII. Committee Reports

� a. Executive Committee

K. Howell said they discussed the upcoming elections and Gary Stewart’s application, but that they would be discussing these things later in the agenda.

� b. Staff Award Recognition

D. Stein said they haven’t met yet but hope to do so in the upcoming weeks. They will be giving another Dedicated Service award in April or May, and they have two new applications to review.

� c. Communication

K. Howell reviewed which members were supposed to write the next EA News & View articles.

In response to B. Cornell’s statement that he’s heard a lot of people really enjoy these articles, D. Stein echoed this sentiment stating that the quality of the EA columns has really improved.

There was a discussion about the feasibility of distributing a list highlighting the dates each EA member was responsible for writing the article. K. Howell said she would distribute a list.

K. Howell said the committee is working with transportation to write blurbs, such as those they wrote for the childcare center, so that they can share them with their constituents.

� d. Finance

B. Liddick said they hadn’t met, but L. Lawrence had volunteered to join. There are no pressing issues, but a meeting, even via phone, might be a good idea. He asked P. Mahoney to set this up.

� e. Emergency Grant Fund

D. Stein said he would contact Deb Billups about her membership on the committee; she has been out of the country. They have been receiving applications. He said one application was recently rejected because the applicant was a contractor for Cornell, but didn’t receive a regular paycheck from the university, and so wasn’t technically considered an employee. He thinks it might be a good idea to look at how they can help people in dire situations who may not be Cornell employees but do have some connection to the university.

In response to B. Cornell’s suggestion that they hold a meeting about it, D. Stein said he thought that would be a proactive step, because they’re getting more applications of this kind.

� f. Personnel Policy

P. Korolov said D. Goss was unable to attend the meeting. She does have something to report but was unable to relay that to them before the meeting.

� g. IOC

P. Korolov said that IOC updates would be addressed later in the agenda.

� h. University Benefits

P. Korolov said D. Goss would give an update on this committee’s meeting at their next meeting. In response to J. Magura’s statement that she is interested in this committee, he gave her some information about it and said he would give up his seat so she could fill it.

� i. Employee Education

P. Korolov said that he had no report on this from D. Goss.

In response to P. Mahoney’s statement that she knows people interested in joining this committee, A. Epstein said B. Cornell could appoint them if they submitted an online committee application, so P. Mahoney said she would send them a link to do this.

There was a brief discussion about whether they should consider asking D. Goss to relinquish some of her Chair responsibilities, since some members felt she seemed overstretched.

IX. Old Business

� a. Winter Retreat Recap (Late Addition to the Agenda)

B. Cornell asked the EA members to review the document he had distributed regarding the winter retreat, and to let him know if they had revisions to make to the document.

� b. Gary Stewart application to EA � discussion & appointment

There was a discussion about appointing G. Stewart to a contract exempt seat on the assembly and about the appropriateness of appointing him without him being in attendance. Korolov made the motion to appoint G. Stewart. K. Howell seconded the motion. By a vote of 5–2−1, G. Stewart was appointed.

X. New Business

� a. Election rules discussion

There was a discussion about distributing the election rules and sending feedback via email because of time constraints. A. Epstein said they could do this, and the IOC could vote on them.

There was a discussion about the number of signatures candidates should be required to collect to be eligible for the ballot. They decided to continue requiring twenty-five signatures, for now.

There was a discussion about allowing hardcopy, in addition to online, submissions of materials, since some employees lack access to the Internet. A. Epstein said that those employees without Internet access could contact the Office of Assemblies to be exempt from online submission.

XI. Adjournment

P. Mahoney made a motion to adjourn the meeting. P. Korolov seconded the motion. B. Cornell adjourned the meeting at 1:40pm.