Minutes for January

Thursday, January 24, 2008, 2 P.M.
Avaya Auditorium - ACES building

Members Present

Timothy Barber, Joe Barroso, Denise Berry, Benjamin Bond, Steven Brahm, Linda Breining, Layne Brewster-Smith, Greg Browning, Gus Castellanos, Johnnie Conley, Lara Eakins, Nelson Fahlund, Danielle Fournier, Lisa Gentry, John Goutier, Chrissi Guerrero, Phillip Guerrero, Bretna Hackert, Bob Hemby, Sarah Hlavac, Sara Jackson Watson, Troy Johnson, Richard Lee, Gary Martt, Cindy May, Rita Moreno, Joyce Moyer, Linda Overton, Pamela  Owen, Eric Patkowski, Elaine Rafferty, Janet Reed, Ben Rodriguez, Christopher Scherer, Mark Smyth, Allison Supancic, Meredith Taylor, Dixie Terry, Mindy Thompson, Robert Walker, Erin Waneck, Leigh Ashley Williams, Blake Willms, Brittany Wilson, Denise Zuniga, Vicki Nguyen-Student Rep.

Members Absent With Notification

Sharon Bernard, Craig Blaha, Vickie Drake, Martha Harrison, Vicki Kullberg, Debra Madden, Jennifer McClain, Kimberly Montroy, Martha Ramey, Barbara Thompson, Evan Turner.

Members Absent

Drew Carls, Tommy Downey, Dreya Johannsen, Emil Kresl, Rebecca Ledbetter, Shelton Lewis, Michael McFarlin, Monica Pena-Mercado, Felix Sanchez Jr., Henna Tayyeb, Helen Wormington.

Meeting commenced at 2 p.m. without quorum present.

Chair, Erin Waneck:

• Reminds everyone that our next meeting is February 21st, and if you can not make it to notify the Recording Secretary Benjamin Rodriguez
• Introduces Gwen Grigsby Associate Vice President for Government Relations, Pat Ohlendorf, from Legal Affairs Office, was not able to come.

Gwen Grigsby (handout The Dos and Don’ts of and Election Year):

• As State Employees we are not allowed to lobby, but we can give information to the people who work for the University that can lobby to help make choices.
• We are currently in an interim, we haven’t had an interim in the last six or seven years. It is nice to have this break to catch our breath and meet the new members and staff at the capital.
• You can write to you legislator on your own time but you cannot use university letter head.

1. We can lobby, but it has to be on our own time. It cannot be during work hours unless you’ve taken personal time.
2. We can work through/with The Board of Regents and they make the final decision as to what is taken to the Legislators.
3. If you are a union member you can lobby with them, but once again it has to be on personal time.

Q: Blake Williams Dist. 652; We can not use any State equipment to lobby so if we want to draft a letter we can not do it at work we need to be on “our own time.” After the last session Pres. Powers sent a letter discussing his disappointment with the legislators and how they didn’t fully fund us(the university). I know some departments do favors for legislators, my question is do we track these favors in anyway and if they continue to not fully fund us will we continue to do such favors?

A: I would not call them favors, but we do have contacts that call and request to check in on applicants to make sure everything is in order, but no we do not keep a list.

Q: Danielle Fournier Dist. 210.1; If we feel strongly to do letter writing campaign, how restricted are we from organizing this if it is not on work time? Can I announce at a meeting we are going to do this?

A: You can say that you are all meeting at a place such as Shultz’s after hours, but you are crossing the line if you announce that you are going to get together to write letters of opposition. Even if there is a march or protest that you wish to partake in you have to make sure that you are on personal time, or on your own time.

Q: If we belong to an organization outside of the university that works with the legislation, how interested is your office in any info that we may have about things concerning the university, or should we not contact you?

A: We are very interested in this. The university is huge and we are not always able to gather everything, so we encourage this. You can contact my office 512-232-1781. Or email: gwen.grigsby@austin.utexas.edu

Q: If we invite a legislator to speak on campus, is this allowed?

A: I would defer that to Patty’s office.

Q: Erin Waneck Dist. 692; It is my understanding as university employees we can not go and lobby, but as an individual you can go on lobby day.

A: That is correct.

Q: So, if on your lunch break you wanted to hand out flyers or work a table you could as long as it was a designated lunch break?

A: Yes.

Q: What about campaign buttons, tee shirts and the likes in your cubicle?

A: I will be cautious, I think as a citizen that it is ok but we must keep in mind of our work environment and those we work with. Keep it tasteful and it should be alright.

Q: Bretna Hackert Dist. 540; We get issues with staff who want to know if they have to post their picture on the web because their boss wants everyone’s picture from the department posted, do they have to?

A: This is a Legal Affair’s question and I would call Patty (512-471-1241) to get the answer.

Q: Danielle Fournier; How do we bring an issue, that is not on the agenda, to the attention to of the administration?

A:  One would be to contact me, because I already have my 81st session file started, or to talk with your higher admins to see if it is Legislation issues. If it is not it is easier to change.

The president is going to be focused on the “Big Rock”, funding. You are in the trenches and may see something that we are unaware of and we track about 2500 bills that are filled every year, so we track a lot.

Q: Erin Waneck; We get issues that are for the Legislators, one such that comes to mind is sick time. Some state employees can utilize their sick time as a benefit towards their retirement, but we can not. So, we should forward these things to you?

A: Those types of things I would start with Julien Carter. Try to get a sense of what is the university-wide affect as an individual, a group or the whole and what is the cost impact before the admin will look into issues.

Q: There are Subcommittees about pay raises for Higher Ed. and we were wondering if there is anyone who goes to these from the university because there was no one from any of the UT Schools in attendance.

A: That kind of meeting is done over time and they don’t post when they are going to happen. You tend to find out about them when you pass someone and they ask you if you heard about it going on. But pay raises are in the forefront of the President’s presentation as he goes into any legislation and next month is the start of one committee talks for higher education. There are just so many related things that happen we may miss a few. But we do try to cover as many as possible. But, all counterparts in Higher Ed. Offices work together and compare notes and cover each other if we miss a meeting to cover all the bases.

CHAIR

• Thank you for coming and let’s give her around of applause.

1. The handout is a summary of the standards and policies of what we operate on.
2. Patty Ohlendorf has invited us to send her issues with any legal questions that we could not answer today.

• We are having a Brown Bag Lunch, this is in addition to the regular meeting, so you are not required to come, but we encourage everyone who is able to attend to come. It is scheduled for the Quadrangle Room 3.304 in the Texas Union on February 26th from 12-2. We scheduled this during lunch in hopes that many can come. This is informal and we hope this can be a good way to recruit new reps and get our name out. Also, we will be able to help fill out forms for issues if anyone has them and answer question about what it is we do.
• While we have a quorum I would like to rearrange the schedule a bit and ask Eric to present the two issues we have concerning by-laws that we could not vote on in December because we did not have a quorum.

Eric Patkowski Chair of the By-Laws Committee

• Proposed Historian Position: Added to section VI. Executive Officers iii. Assistant to the Recording Secretary.

1. Motion to adopt this addition moved by Danielle Fournier.
2. Motion 2nd.
3. Passed

• Proposed addition of a Vice Chairs to committees: Added to III. Membership section G. Duties and VIII. UTSC Standing Committees section D

1. Motion to adopt by Bretna Hackert
2. Motion 2nd
3. Passed

• CHAIR: We just lost Evan Turner as the Chair of Miscellaneous Benefits Committee because he is going to the night shift, and this is a good example of why the Vice Chair is going to be an important seat. We would like to have someone ready to take over if someone has to leave their position.

CHAIR introduces Danielle Fournier to discuss her Ad-Hoc Committee

Danielle Fournier Vice Chair of UTSC

• Looking for volunteers to serve on the Ad-Hoc Committee on Evaluations (Issue 2006-22/2006-24)

1. Looking for people who would like to serve that have evaluation experience
2. Those who are interested can email Danielle
3. If you have Evaluation Issues please sent them to the Ad-Hoc.
4. A reminder will be sent out looking for volunteers.

• Ad-Hoc Committees needing formed

1. 1. ID Services for Non-Main Campus Facilities (Issues 2002-11)
   2. Childcare Availability (Issue 2003-29)
   3. Staff Legal Benefit-Elective Coverage (Issue 2004-13)

• ID Services for Non-Main Campus Facilities

1. They do now have mobile services for those offsite (PRC and MCC) and electronic processes for other campuses that do not have this service.
2. Do we still need a committee formed for this?
3. Open discussion: Dixie Terry Dist. 210.2; we have not had a problem out at PRC because we now get them in the mail.
   1. Nelson Fahlund moves to close the issue
   2. Motion 2nd.
   3. Passed

• Childcare Availability

1. Open discussion: Erin Waneck; Since Ad-Hoc members don’t have to be UTSC members I would like to open this up to volunteers across campus and if we don’t get any type of response that is a response.
   1. Erin moves to send out an email to all campus wide for volunteers.
   2. Motion moved
   3. Passed

• Staff Legal Benefit-Elective Coverage

1. HR is looking at this currently and we are waiting for a response from him about where this is standing.
2. Danielle moves to wait for the response from HR since they may resolve this on their own. Correction this was discussed concerning the topic of a SWIAC meeting with Vickie not HR
3. Erin requests a letter to Julien confirming they are working on this matter.
4. Layne Brewster-Smith, Is this the same as what the student have?
   • Danielle, that is my understanding.

1. Moved to 2nd the idea to wait back from Julien.
1. passed

 CHAIR invites Benjamin Rodriguez, Recording Secretary, to get the approval for the November and December minutes.

• Motion to Pass November minutes
1. Motion 2nd.
2. Motion passed.

• Motion to pass the December minutes

1. Motion 2nd.
2. Motion passed.

CHAIR

• DRO survey is finished but not published. We have decided to wait until it is published until we reply and once we have the comments that were written at the end of the survey.

CHAIR introduces Ashley Williams from the Communication Committee to talk about the new UTSC brochure.

Ashley Williams

• Presents the UTSC brochure.
• There is a detachable sheet that can be mailed to UTSC to present new issues or ask questions.
• We still need a mail code.
• Erin asks for around of applause for all the work that has gone into this.
• This is another way that people without email can communicate with us.

CHAIR

• All UTSC web issues are on hold until HR finishes with the Homeland Security Project. We can still update it but can not do anything dealing with programming.
• In March we are going to try and take new photos for the web since it will be nicer out then.

CHAIR asks Bretna Hackert Chair of the Retirement Committee to give their report.

Bretna Hackert

• There are three issues that are standing.
• Issue 2002-1: Improving our 403B plan was voted on Oct 17, 2002
• 2004-11: Optional Retirement Eligibility was voted on Jan 20, 2005.
• 2004-25: TRS Board of Director’s Candidate Pre-Qualification was voted on in Sept 15, 2005.
• Therefore, all these are considered closed.

CHAIR Asks Eric Patkowski to read from the new By-Laws changes proposals for At Large Reps.

Eric Patkowski

• Reads proposed changes to add At Large Reps. to part III. Membership, section A. and the addition of part IV section F 1-5.

Please send any feed back so we can vote next month. The web link was sent out in an email where you can view these changes.

CHAIR New Business

• Steve Brahm brought up the matter of 8hrs of comp. time to exercise.

• This matter was brought up to Julien Cater and he stated that they are waiting to see how other Institutions handle this before the university moves forward.
• Steve Brahm Dist. 621; Would like to see some kind of program worked out such as a certified website that you log your hours on and when you finish you can receive a certificate that entitles you to the comp. time. There is a website you can go to see the Institutions that currently participate. www.texasroundup.org
• There you can even compete with other agencies, the Aggies are on there….
• Would like to write a letter to HRS to state that we would like to participate in this program
• Erin, motion to write the letter
• Motion 2nd.
• Passed to write letter

• Chris Scherer Dist 511; Proposes to install cameras on buildings due to crime on campus. The buildings proposed are ones that currently have control rooms with 24/7 monitoring. So the addition to cost would be minimum.

• Motion to write letter to Bob Harkens.
• Motion 2nd.
• Passed.
• Would like to see this studied further to gather what other building have 24/7 monitoring and ask for more info on what projects are currently in motion for staff safety. Ask about the possibility of walking police beats. The on going construction adds to this worry because of the blockage of pathways without signage to detours.
• Please remember to send any comments and ideas about the Brown Bag.

1. Motion to Adjourn
2. 2nd.
3. Passed

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