Minutes - March 11, 2004

These minutes were approved at the UT Staff Council meeting on April 15, 2004.

Members Present: Michael Acuna, Pat Alfano, Mack Andrews, Karis Beasley, Janet Bensman, Alison Louise Brown, Philemon Brown, Joni Burks, Helen Burnette, Melba Catchings, Johnnie Conley, Julie Cunniff, Laura Davis, Phillip Dubov, Margaret Evans, Neil Fahlund, Rick Garza, Phil Gavenda, Sandra Godfrey, Andrew Gordon, Kathy Guajardo, Gayle Hight, Dora Hilgart, Margaret Hill, Kim Johnson, Noah Lowenstein, Earl McMannis Jr., Kim Montroy, Peggy Mueller, Greg Murphy, Ana Raley, Jo Ann Richmond, Leslie Saucedo, Jennifer Scalora, J.R. Schlesinger, Ann Seago, Frank Simon, Sandra Sleeper, Didi Smith, Sheril Smith, Joe Sosler, Jerry Spillar, J.R. Watson, Shane Williams, Glen Worley

Members Absent with Notification: Alanna Burney, Oscar Carmona, Marlis Dagg, Pratrice Fox, Royce Gehrels, Bert Herigstad, Elizabeth Korves, Jim McElroy, Mery Beth Mercatoris, Amy Pinkston, Kitty Villa

Members Absent: Vickie Amidon, Jan Ballard, Augustin Collao, Suzanne Goodman, Stella Smith, Christy Habecker, John Hibbits, Thomas Horn, Marcus Horton, George Hughes, PG Moreno, John Nelson, Sam Owens, Chuck Pearson, Jorge Puig, Kay Randall, Stella Smith, Erin Waneck

Guests: Dr. Fred Heath, Vice Provost and Director of General Libraries

Human Resource Services: Debra Kress, Monica Reed

Quorum: 75 filled UTSC representative places divided by 2 = 38 (for quorum)

Welcome:

Chair Glen Worley called to order the regular meeting of the UT Staff Council at 2:05 p.m. on Thursday March 11, 2004 in Main 212. 45 UTSC representatives were present.

Guest Talk:

Dr. Heath began by saying that this was a great university, with a great faculty and staff. He is delighted to be here. He invited us to visit the General Libraries as it is a great, free resource with amazing collections. Staff has the same privileges as Faculty. Some of the resources available to staff are: the popular reading sections at FAC and PCL, the 6th floor of PCL is where the Youth Collection is located. This collection is huge and every year all the books that win awards are added to the collection. Fine Arts is a well kept secret with a large collection of sound recordings, Life Science has collections on gardening, plants, and wildlife. At FAC, one can copy their own CDs (the sound collection here is 40,000 plus). PCL has newspapers and magazines from around the state, country, and world. The Benson Latin American Collection is the largest collection of its type in the world and scholars from around the world come to use this collection.

One can also use a lot of these resources online at the General Libraries website. The online collections consist of 100,000 electronic books; there are 1000's of digital maps, for example: digital maps of the Edwards Aquifer.

The General Libraries greatest resource are the people who make all these things accessible. They are the key players who made the launch of Utopia successful. They can help with assistance by answering questions, helping with finding materials, etc. Another great resource is Inter-Library Loan. If the library does not have the material you need, it can be borrowed from another library or institution elsewhere in the country. Other resources available are the HRC, Blanton, the Tarleton Law Library, among others on campus.

He concluded by saying that we are among the best of the best. He solicited from staff suggestions on additions of services and resources that could be added to the library. It is his goal to make the General Libraries the best research library in the world.

Announcements:

• Next meeting is Thursday, April 15, 2004 from 2:00pm to 3:30pm, Main 212.
• Frank Simon, District 231, is now the Interim Chair of the Bylaws Committee through May 31, 2004. Shane Williams, District 190.2, was selected to serve as Chair beginning June 1, 2004.
• "Cops" will give a presentation at the April meeting. Peggy Mueller is on this UTPD Oversight Committee.
• Greg Murphy was given the TexasExes Award for Academic Advising.

Chair's report:

Ann Seago, and the Chair will attend the next UT System Employees Advisory Council March 25-26 in Galveston , TX .

Vice Chair's report:

University Leadership Council Meeting, March 01, 2004

1. UT Votes. Presentation made by Ryan Petkoff and Courtney Livingston. The goal of this non-partisan student initiative is to increases civic participating (specifically voting) among the student demographic (18-24) which has usually had very low participation.

They intend to effect a "behavioral change" among students at UT, making three assumptions. 1) Students need 3-5 early encounters in the voting process to be active; 2) Campus leaders will set the standard; 3) organization and events work to get out the vote. The are using a peer-to-peer model for this initiative, employing student and faculty and staff liaisons to help reach the goal of as many registered voters as possible by April 1.

2. Explore UT. Richard Lariviere (Liberal Arts) praised the efforts of the Explore UT faculty and staff who were preparing for the vent and urged his colleagues to attend and invite others.

3. Report on the Diversity in Higher Education Conference held at UT. Presentation made by the Chair of the School of Journalism. She had three major points that emerged from the Conference: 1) No one has all the answers; no institution is dealing with the issue of diversity as effectively as they would like; 2) All participants agreed to each do "one thing every day" to further the development of diversity on college campuses; 3) The conference was meant to dovetail with the UT Task Force on Racial Diversity report that is now on President Faulkner's desk and would provide background and context for the plans the the administration will make based on the report.

4. Task Force Reports. President Faulkner said that he has now four major Task Force reports on his desk awaiting review and action:

1. Racial Relations
2. Tuition Rate
3. Educational and Student Life
4. Enrollment Management

He told the group that we was now soliciting what he called "concrete programmatic suggestions" to implement as a result of these reports. He encouraged the members of the group to contact him directly with their suggestions and ideas.

5. Budget Report. Budget Director Mary Knight presented. She gave a timeline for the various phases of the budget process. There will be raises for the new fiscal year, but they will be merit based. There will be a three percent merit pool and departments can add an extra one percent to that if the department has the funds. This is the same situation that existed for the last round of raises. The three percent pool applies both to faculty and staff.

Classified salary ranges will be adjusted upward by two percent. This means that anyone currently receiving the entry level salary for a position will receive a two percent raise as the entry level salary will be increased by that much. However, this does not mean that everyone will automatically get a two percent across the board raise.

6. Health Benefits. Presentation by Kyle Cavanaugh. He emphasized the early picture- not finalized yet.

• It appears that those employees hired before September 1, 2003 will retain the existing salary supplement.
• For employee-only insurance- appears that there will be no premium increase
• It is likely that insurance for dependents will have a premium increase of around ten percent
• It is not clear whether the HMO option will be continued next year
• Kyle promised to get us the finalized information on all benefit information as soon as it is available from UT System.

7. Admissions Report. Presentation made by Bruce Walker, Director of Admissions. The new policy is now going to UT System for final approval. Assistant to the President Charles Roeckle will be writing the draft of the appeal to use race as part of the process, but provisions must be made for the Pharmacy School and for Transfer Students. The intent, he said, is to come up with a policy that is "defensible to a legal assault." This is not "affirmative action" as before; race is a part but not a key and there are no quotas. Faulkner said it would be important to manage expectations; that big changes are expected but not likely. Walker said that the top-10% rule would result in 160 more freshman admitted with a 5% smaller applicant pool and would top 66% of the entering class next year.

8. Capital Improvement Plan. Bruce Hegarty presented. The six-year plan is from 03 through 08/09. The plan makes the following assumptions:

• Current interest rate
• Not tuition increases after 2004
• No change in state funding
• Institutionally funded projects only (i.e., not the hotel)

Existing expenses total 58M. This includes Blanton, Batts, Biomedical, Nanoscience, Wet Lab and the PAC (Fire and Life Safety).

Recurring expenses total 120.9M. This includes items like a catastrophe reserve (1M), classroom renovation (1M) and academic space improvements (3.5M) and much more.

9. Commencement. Susan Clagett presented. She said that in the past, when a head of state had spoken at Commencement, restrictions had been tight but of course they would be much tighter now. It is likely that the ceremony would be moved the the stadium and would go ahead, rain or shine. Expected to fill up, the capacity would be 46,500 seats. Graduates would be expected to more than double, from 3500 to 6500 and that 7 tickets for family and friends per graduate would be issued. The public would not be invited. She noted that most of the college ceremonies would have to be re-scheduled if this takes place and that it is likely the White House would want to make the announcement 2-3 weeks prior. She asked that all Deans send a contact person to a meeting to discuss logistics this week.

10. Hearts of Texas. This year's campaign was described as successful despite the fact that the aggregate number of dollars was down this year because participation was actually up slightly with a smaller number of employees (who didn't get a raise) taking part.

The Chair pointed out that the UTSC is now getting the same information at the same time as the other leadership councils on campus, for example: Health Benefits. UTSC is perceived as being responsible with the passing down of information.

One Rep asked for clarification of what's meant by "the responsible handling of information."

The Chair responded: Examples of this would be the HMO and the Salary situations, we have been given all the pertinent information that's available and have passed this along to our constituents.

Another Rep said that they had tried to forward this information through the group lists that have been set up and they came back. 

The Chair of Communications will look into this.

Recorder/Secretary's report:

Call for approval of Minutes from the previous meeting

Committee reports:

Standing: (Bylaws, Committee on Committees, Communications, Issues, Nominations and Elections)

Frank Simon, Bylaws:

The Chair of the Bylaws Committee gave a report on the Bylaws Committee's last meeting on February 27, 2004. Shane Williams was selected to serve as Chair beginning June 1, 2004. Frank Simon will serve as Interim Chair through May 31, 2004. 

The committee discussed several issues and makes the following recommendations:

• The new member orientation sheet, which Glen Worley prepared, contains great information on Robert's Rules of Order. Every UTSC delegate should get a copy of this sheet.
• The committee needs two more UTSC delegates to volunteer to serve on the Bylaws Committee
• Parliamentarians for UTSC general meetings should be members of the Bylaws Committee serving as needed
• The name of the committee should be changed to "Bylaws and Procedure."
• The Chair of the UTSC should, at his discretion, consider suspending the rules at the end of New Business during UTSC general meetings to allow informal discussions on topics of interest to the UTSC.

The Chair of UTSC: won't this name change be an amendment.

Chair of the Bylaws Committee: yes, it will.

UTSC then voted to put this amendment to change the name of the Bylaws Committee on the agenda to vote at the next meeting.

Phil Gavenda, Communications:

The Chair of Communications reported on The President's Committee on Campus Community website. The website is not ready yet. Its purpose will be to solicit advise from the UT community. An email will be sent out when it is finished and up.

Didi Smith, Issues:

Issues Summary - March 04:

2004-1 Revise Staff Evaluation Process; Didi Smith - District 311

Objective: 1) Add annual evaluation of supervisors by staff (on-line surveys, like instructors', so there is input without fear); and/or 2) Investigate and report on a 360 evaluation process - having feedback from more than just your supervisor; i.e., co-workers and people you supervise.
Reason: A better evaluation process would help staff morale and give a clearer representation of an employee's strengths and weaknesses.

2004-3 Bevo Bucks use by Staff; Glen Worley - District 130

Objective: Find out if policy on Bevo Bucks can be changed so that staff can use Bevo Bucks.
Reason: Currently staff can use Dine in Dollars, but only students can use Bevo Bucks which are taken by food services not affiliated with Food and Housing. Staff member wants to know if this policy can be changed.

2004-4 Code 1000 positions lack of Job Security; Dora Hilgart - District 360

Objectives: 1) Change Code 1000 provisions to include job security and to be subjected to the same disciplinary/grievance process as Classified or create a discipline/grievance policy specific to code 1000; or change some Code 1000 titles back to Classified; or create a new category of titles that are professional yet maintain job security (separate jobs that are temporary such as someone hired to manage a 2 or 3 year research project and those that are long term). 2) Prior to appointment, employee is given clear description of the difference between classified vs. code 1000 designation in terms of appointment period, expectations in terms of overtime, vacation, etc.
Reason: It is counterproductive to offer our most skilled employees position titles with no job security.

Discussion:

One Rep said that he could understand the reasoning behind the 1000 code positions with grant funded research related jobs but did not understand why there are other types of 1000 code positions that are not grant/research related.

The Chair responded that he did not know either.

Another Rep answered by giving an example of why they were used at her unit. That it gives the Director of the unit greater flexibility in hiring than the classified positions do.

The Chair said that research will be done on this to clear up the mystery so that everyone understands why these types of position are used and the pros/cons of using them.

The Issue was approved and went to Compensation and Classification.

Noah Lowenstein, Nominations and Elections:

The Chair of N&E updated the council on the upcoming Nomination/Election schedule and announced that on March 1 the eligibility calculation process had been performed. The other dates/time periods mentioned last time are official now. Reported on the meeting with District Contacts that was held on March 2. The District Contacts (DC) asked several questions:

1. What to do when there is no Nominee for the District? It was suggested that the DCs work with the incumbent representative and use their knowledge of the staff in their district to locate potential nominees who would work well with the council.
    
2. During the Campaign Period, what if there is a low or no turn out to the campaign event. It was suggested that the Reps encourage their constituents to turn out, or to have the nominees prepare a brief 1 page statement about who the are, what they bring to the staff council, and their background and then have that information distributed to the staff in the district by the district contact.

An email will go out this afternoon to everyone eligible to vote announcing the election and will provide an URL (who's my representative page) with information on district membership, eligibility to nominate/vote in UTSC elections, eligibility to hold a UTSC representative position, when the next UTSC election in their district is, who their current representative(s) are, and contact information for their current representative.

The Chair of N&E commended the HRS staff and said that they have put in a lot of time and effort to make the elections work, and noted specifically the work done by Ethan Diehl and Yan Zuo in creating the "who's my representative" web page.

He also said that March 22 is the next step in the election process, as that is when the nomination period will begin. Those eligible to nominate in the election this year will receive notification and instructions on March 22.

Discussion:

One Rep asked if there was a process for staff without email.

The Chair of N&E answered yes, that a paper version will be sent to them by campus mail. The Chair added that these people, as long as they had an UT-EID, can still vote on the web. They will still get the paper version of the email sent to staff with email addresses.

Ana Raley, Committee on Committees:

The Chair of C on C met with the Faculty Council, Committee on Committees on March 3rd, to present our proposal to add staff members to more committees; the proposal was very well received and we are awaiting their final review/comments and their 'counter-proposal', to add staff to various committees across campus. I expect to hear back from them any day now.

Working: (Classification and Compensation Committee; Grievance; Insurance; Miscellaneous Benefits; Parking and Transportation; Retirement)

Unfinished business:

None

New business:

One Rep asked when the Issues Database was going to be online.

The Chair answered, saying that this was in the hands of the programmers. While this is the direction we want to go, it will probably be a few months before it is actually happens.

Adjournment:

A motion to adjourn was made and the meeting ended at 3:27 p.m.

The next regular meeting of the UTSC is April 15; 2:00-3:30 p.m., Main 212.