Dear President Skorton.

It is with pleasure that I forward for your consideration five Resolutions that were passed at Tuesday’s University Assembly Meeting.

Resolution 10 (Investigating an Open Access Policy for Cornell) requests the formation of a committee to investigate the feasibility of, and campus support for, implementing an open access policy for scholarly publications at Cornell. It also requests the committee issue a report to the UA and Faculty Senate no later than November. This Resolution received broad support at UA meetings including the Chair of the Faculty Library Board. Although no formal vote has been taken on this issue recently within the Faculty Senate, this proposal does have the informal support of many Faculty Senate members as well as the Dean of Faculty. No negative comments were received during our 30 day on-line public comment period.

Resolution 11 (Toward New Destinations and Cornell’s Campus Climate) requests University Diversity Officers meet with the UA at least once per academic year in a panel format to discuss successes and challenges in the TWD framework over the past year; keeps the UA informed of major changes in the implementation or administration of the TWD framework as well as major changes in the procedures used to report bias incidents; and makes some recommendations to increase publicity of TWD initiatives. This Resolution has the support of the University Diversity Officers and received no negative inputs during a 30-day public comment period.

Resolution 12 (Updated Resolution to Modify Campus Code to Clarify the Rights of Complainants to Appeal Summary Decision Agreements) clarifies the timelines related to summary decision appeals, and puts the complainant and the accused on equal footing with regard to their individual rights regarding appeals. This resolution was initiated by the Judicial Administrators office and received no negative inputs during the 30-day public comment period.

Resolution 13 (Updated Resolution to Transfer Title IX Cases to Cornell University Policy 6.4) makes the administrative adjustments needed to formally integrate University Policy 6.4 into the Campus Code of Conduct. This Resolution was initiated internally by the UA when University Policy 6.4 was published, however, work on it was delayed while the UA’s Codes and Judicial Committee focused on issues stemming from the Ho Plaza incident of November 2012. Again, no negative inputs were received during the 30-day public comment period.

Resolution 14 (Addressing the TCAT Deficit) was amended from the original to explicitly recommend that Cornell commit to funding the projected $500K deficit to TCAT related to ridership without eliminating free first year student passes or otherwise increasing costs to riders at Cornell. The UA also knows, however, that Transportation Services will need a workable financial solution before July, so this Resolution also requests Facilities immediately set up a working group that includes UA and Campus Infrastructure Committee Members, community members, and the Provost to reach the best interim and long-term solutions. This Resolution went through many amendments, and was the product of intense debate within the Assembly and extensive public input which included 25 pages of comments against our initial proposal. The current, passed version of Resolution 14 expresses both UA Members’ concerns as well as those expressed by the community.

Respectfully Submitted
-Jim