University Assembly Meeting
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
4:30–6:00 p.m.
B16 Day Hall
DRAFT Minutes

I. Call to Order

J. Glenn called to order at 4:48 p.m.

II. Roll Call

Sent sign-up sheet around to record attendance.

III. Call for Late Additions to Agenda

There were no late additions to the agenda.

IV. Approval of Minutes

December 6, 2006

J. Glenn asked for corrections or suggestions. There were none.

M. Hatch moved to approve minutes, R. Kay seconded. Voted and approved.

February 28, 2007

M. Hatch suggested keeping the February 28th draft minutes out when discussing liaisons. It might be helpful.

Several members gave corrections to amend the minutes.

J. Glenn asked for any more changes or questions. J. Marwell motioned to approve the minutes. K. Duch seconded. Voted and approved.

V. New Business

Letter to President Skorton

J. Marwell said GPSA passed a resolution about the campus code and the CJC report, supporting what we did, and we’re going to include that.

M. Hatch asked if the assembly could just say the GPSA passed a resolution. Do we want to include the resolution?

J. Marwell said yes.

K. Duch said the SA is presenting a similar resolution this week or maybe next week depending on the agenda. She said she would email J. Marwell after the meeting to let her know what happens.

J. Glenn asked for any more comments.

M. Hatch said the assembly could say in the letter in a sentence that there’s an attached resolution in support.

K. Duch said it’s on the agenda tomorrow, but she doesn’t know if they’ll get to it. She will email the executive board, and she will forward the resolution to the UA if it passes.

D. Rosen said the assembly could just say that the supporting resolution is attached.

M. Hatch agreed.

Committee Liaison Discussion

J. Glenn said this idea was brought up at the last executive board meeting and it’s reflected in our February 28th meeting minutes. The assembly talked about an ad hoc committee to look at relevant committees to the UA. Some committees need to be taken out of our charter or off our purview, and the assembly needs to decide what we need to and don’t need to do with the committees. He asked for interested members to be involved.

D. Brown clarified that these were committees the assembly discussed 3 meetings ago. The assembly’s intent is to keep them and activate right, not remove them from the charter right?

J. Glenn said some committees haven’t met, and this is just an overall cleaning up of what they’re doing. It hasn’t happened in the UA for a long time.

M. Hatch asked A. Epstein if he could write a list of the committees on the board. He’s asking because TAC hasn’t met for a long time. If the assembly has a list of committees, the assembly can decide right now and we don’t have to talk about staffing with liaisons or charter changes. Which committees do we want to become more active in? We can think who wants to get involved in a committee. What we don’t want to get involved in, we don’t have to take a stand in on yet. It’s a major undertaking revising the charter. , but we We shouldn’t let that get in the way of our participation in profitable and beneficial committees.

J. Marwell said T. Bishop and the executive board discussed putting together a resolution with the help of the Office of Assemblies in getting the chairs of all the assemblies together at the beginning of year. We can write this resolution to have this next year by the September meeting by the charge of the Office of Assemblies.

M. Hatch said there are possibilities: the assembly can do a broader assessment at the beginning of next year to consider what we want to do, whether it is drop the committees from the charter; or the assembly can look at them now. We should keep in mind what E. Sanders suggested about the fire alarm or police patrol systems. The assembly may decide that some committees might want to be put on these statuses or some we might not want to get involved with at all, which means we would have three categories. The assembly doesn’t have to think of that yet; it can wait until the fall to do that.

M. Hatch said looking at the listed committees, CJC Transportation and Campus Planning are active but not with us.

A. Epstein said they are active, but they haven’t reported to the UA.

J. Glenn redirected the meeting. We can put together a group of three or four people in an ad hoc committee who can study this and report back to us with what they’ve found out. The assembly can keep this moving in that direction and report back at the April meeting.

D. Brown said he was appointed the TAC chair. At this moment, transportation policies are being made without the UA. There are some good things and some bad because there’s no input from the community. He asked for assembly support or people that can help. He’s proposing a meeting for two days: April 11th and April 25th.

A. O’Donnell said April 25th is the next UA meeting.

D. Brown moved it to Monday, April 23rd. He asked people to help him round up who’s on it, so they can get it reactivated. He apologized for being out of the country until now.

J. Glenn asked for anyone interested in the ad hoc committee to dig through history etc. and to investigate the structure change? T. Bishop, R. Orme, and R. Kay raised their hands.

J. Glenn asked them to find a time and have a point person to report back to the UA. He suggested working with A. Epstein and A. O’Donnell, and said it would be helpful to the UA next year.

M. Hatch said E. Sanders said she was very interested. She couldn’t be here right now so he said he would get in touch with her. He asked if anyone would be interested in becoming a liaison in Campus Planning since CJC already is fully active with a liaison. We need to make contact with this committee and find out what’s going on. Why should we wait for another month?

J. Glenn suggested letting this group work first before the UA starts to do anything.

A. Epstein said in the unique case of Campus Planning, it is very active and there is plenty to report. The University planner is happy to present on the master plan to the UA. For that one case, anyone interested should just go to the meeting.

M. Hatch asked who could be the liaison to Campus Planning for the UA.

A. Epstein said it’s a critical time for Campus Planning. The master plan is underway, and they are working with the master plan working group. If there are any interests with the long-term direction of the University, the next sixth months will be very critical for the master plan.

M. Hatch said if E. Sanders wanted to be on the ad hoc committee, he asked R. Kay if he could be the Campus Planning liaison.

R. Kay agreed.

M. Hatch said T. Bishop has the contact information.

J. Glenn said he is looking forward to the next meeting and see what information will be brought to the assembly from the ad hoc committee and from Campus Planning.

M. Hatch clarified that R. Kay is just the liaison to Campus Planning. The report doesn’t have to be from R. Kay, but it can be from the chair of Campus Planning at the next meeting.

R. Kay agreed to get in touch with her.

VI. Open Discussion

J. Glenn moved on to open discussion and he reiterated the assembly’s thanks to CJC for their hard and wonderful work on the code.

M. Hatch said they got a letter from the President thanking them too.

J. Marwell said there were some people wondering about the recent dog abuse case and how it affects the campus code now as opposed to the Krause report. Basically, a student abused a dog off-campus. In our current code, only exceptionally grave off-campus cases are taken under the code. Under the Krause report, it covers off-campus cases. What is the UA’s perspective?

M. Hatch asked if J. Marwell wanted the UA to take a position for this particular case. Does UA take stands about individual cases like that?

R. Kay said he doesn’t think so. This assembly is not an investigative group.

M. Hatch then asked what J. Marwell was going to say to the people who asked her to take a stand.

A. O’Donnell said the question actually came from our office as a practical case, to suggest how the code now punishes this person and how it is applied�do they get JA’ed or however versus how the Krause report would discipline this person. If the Office of Assemblies is asked, we can give the difference from now and what it would be later.

D. Brown said this points to the tricky and funny things of who has judicial authority, and probably the cleanest and fairest policy if someone has been accused of something off-campus: if it’s being investigated and there are inditements in the real grown up world, we should defer to that until that’s resolved. Cornell pretends to be private, but it really is public in many regards. We should minimize duplication of that. For example, if the police have done something on-campus that the general judicial system has taken care of, Cornell should back off until it’s resolved.

S. Murphy asked if he would suggest temporarily suspending the student until the situation is resolved.

D. Brown said he doesn’t have all the answer, but that is a definite area with problems. If someone pleads guilty or gets convicted, does Cornell need to go through and do that again? Does Cornell need to take action when someone has already been acquitted through a judicial system that’s much more complicated? For example, can an accused murderer out on bail attend classes? Cornell needs to find a balance with protection of own staff, students, and community. We can’t supercede civil authorities. If the civil authorities accuse someone, do we kick them off campus? It would be good to know ahead of time. He said he would favor deferring to civil authority for serious cases.

R. Kay said he’s uncomfortable doing this one case. There have been lots of cases preceding.

J. Marwell said under the current code, it only deals with the gravest situation such as rape and murder. She doesn’t know if animal abuse falls under that. If the Krause report is passed as it is, then how would it be dealt with?

M. Hatch said he doesn’t know. Does Krause say animal abuse is a grave misconduct?

J. Marwell said in terms of off-campus jurisdiction, it can come under the jurisdiction of Cornell.

S. Murphy said it has to rise to a matter of serious grave misconduct. The current code could or couldn’t apply because it depends on how recommendations are made to the President. Any case off-campus is an opportunity to engage in the code if information is brought to the President and he asks. When has happened in the past is that the individual has been temporarily suspended as investigation is done. In the Krause report, it extends the reach of the campus code. She’s not particular in what off-campus activities would be included. Off-campus meaning in this neighborhood or throughout the world? Maybe to say that having it rise to the President is right, and maybe we can explore a little more with what we might include. That’s what we’ve called upon for further consideration.

D. Brown said we should get rid of the sort of double jeopardy information that Cornell has. We should resolve and conclude that if the outside has found a charge to be without merit, Cornell should follow suit. For example, civil authority has found a vandalism case to be unfounded, whether it’s on- or off-campus. Cornell shouldn’t go after people already acquitted or found innocent.

M. Hatch said it would be helpful to the CJC if the UA is filteringwould filter through any recommendations in any this stage of things to know that the UA is starting to think about this. This is a body that will enact any legislation changes the CJC proposes. In the debate about hazing, UA does it. If everyone in the UA says they want to start thinking about it, there are many intricacies to this. There is a section of the Krause report about proposed student disciplinary conduct, where an appropriate decision maker will consider all the relevant facts, determine what sanctions to impose, and what is applicable. We want to think about that. If we already said we don’t want to do this, we’re affirming that the CJC’s right. We will have to come up with similar criteria that goes the route of what’s defines the actions of the President. In the Duke rape case, the President actually took actions to suspend the students and he decertified the coach, who also lost his job. The two cases against the students were dropped by civil authority. Did the President do the right thing by invoking sanctions against students? These are the kinds of things we need to consider when the CJC is deliberating.

S. Murphy said there are different levels of guilt, clear and convincing evidence, violation of educational mission, or preponderance of evidence. That’s the difference between the criminal and civil systems, whether there are violations of the principle of educational institution, and whether we want or don’t want to take action. The CJC will have to entertain all these possibilities.

D. Brown said if the jury found charges without merit, is Cornell going to change its decision? He doesn’t want to get into that. With the Duke case, rape is a serious charge, but going out and getting wasted as a team may not have been illegal, but violates University standards. It will be something that the JA will have jurisdiction over. To second guess the outcome of criminal courts, because the University has a lower standard of proof, we don’t want to get involved in that. Cornell shouldn’t second-guess the criminal justice system.

M. Hatch said that is helpful.

S. Murphy agreed that is the exact question that needs to be hashed out.

J. Glenn asked for more thoughts, announcement, or other topics? There were none.

M. Hatch asked about this discussion and how many members will continue to be on the UA next year.

J. Glenn asked if the CJC will look at this.

M. Hatch said it’s going to, but the President has the right to take it out of our hands and change it. He asked again how many will remain on the UA�three or four?

R. Orme said he doesn’t know for sure, that will be decided at a later date.

M. Hatch said he’s asking because this is what the assembly is going to have to talk about.

R. Kay said citing from the Krause report, there are only students being talked about. Non-work related off-campus activities for faculty�will they be something that the JA will consider? Civil authorities might consider them, but it’s the same thing in parallel.

S. Murphy said the code may apply in theory to anything that could rise to be a serious grave misconduct. In her twelve years of being VP, she’s never known of a case not student-related.

R. Kay asked about University structures or vehicles, etc.

S. Murphy said there have been cases in Rome, NY or other Cornell-owned buildings. They are all covered by the campus code because they are owned by the University.

R. Kay said Krause doesn’t address those things at all.

M. Hatch clarified that it does, it has everything. For example, what if there is an employee who is photographing people illicitly. Is that JA-able? Will that person get affected at work?

R. Kay mentioned child pornography.

S. Murphy said there was that issue with the landlord, and it could have been a Cornell employee.

J. Marwell said the assembly could spend a lot of time going through cases. If there are unique cases, members can them through email.

M. Hatch said they aren’t “what if’s” though, they are examples. What if someone, who abused a dog, graduated a few months ago, so they’re still here. Their name is still associated with the University. Is it something Cornell has jurisdiction over because some codes allow?

D. Brown said there are types of behaviors that aren’t acceptable but are also not illegal to the outside�those might be in our jurisdiction. If there is crime, it should be turned over to civil authority. A number of college campuses are accused of shielding students from civil authority. People walk away from charges they could have gone to jail for. He hopes Cornell won’t do that. We should divide this by whether violations are criminal or whether they are violations of Cornell’s educational mission. Then, it doesn’t matter where you are. That’s another way to divide it.

J. Glenn asked for anything other comments, but there were none.

VII. Adjournment

R. Orme motioned to adjourn. S. Kong seconded the motion.

J. Glenn adjourned the meeting at 5:32 p.m.