Thursday, February 24, 2005

1:00 pm- 3:00 pm by audioconference

Bridge # 1-866-339-5580, conference code *2948929*

Fairbanks site:  Carter Conference Room, Butrovich Building, Fairbanks Campus

 

 

Draft Minutes

 

1.          Call to Order and Roll Call

                                                           

            Present:

 

            Todd Closson, Moderator; President, Kenai Peninsula Student Union

            Michael Blanton, Vice President, Union of Students of UAA

            Abel Bult-Ito, President, UAF Faculty Senate

            Larry Foster, President, UAA Assembly

            Juli Gillispie Vice President, for Lisa Sporleder, President, Statewide

 Administration Assembly

            Paige Gingrich, Organizing Director, Associated Students of UAF, for

              Abbie Stillie, Vice President

            John Mun, Vice President, UAA Assembly

            Josh Steadman, President, UAF Staff Council

            David Woodley, Director, UAA Alumni Association

            Joe Hayes, Executive Director, UAF Alumni Association

 

            Others present:

 

            Mark R. Hamilton, President, University of Alaska

            Joe Beedle, Vice President for Finance

            Mary Gower, Student Enrollment and Management

            Pat Ivey, Executive Officer, System Governance

 

2.         Adopt Agenda

 

            MOTION:  passed as amended without objection

 

“The System Governance Council moves to adopt the agenda as amended to delete the attachment for item 5.  This action is effective February 22, 2005.”

 

3.         Approve December 10, 2004 Minutes 

            http://gov.alaska.edu/council/minutes/2004/12-10.html

 

            MOTION: passed as amended without objection

 

“The System Governance Council moves to approve the minutes for the December 10, 2004 minutes as amended under item 7.1, third sentence to read: ‘The Classified Council is TALKING ABOUT developing a manual on staff rights.’  This action is effective February 22, 2005.”

 

4.                   State of the University  - Mark R. Hamilton, President               

            http://www.alaska.edu/bor/minutes/minutes.xml

 

President Hamilton talked about the budget picture for the university, i.e., pretty good for the short term but difficult in the long term.  The university may not receive funds for PERS and TRS increases this year and benefits costs will continue to escalate.  In order to treat employees like they should be treated, this may mean fewer employees in the long term.

 

Governor Murkowski wants the university more engaged in solving the problems of the state and President Hamilton is engaged in advising Governor Murkowski about how university research works.  President Hamilton expressed enthusiasm about the interest the Governor is taking in engaging the university. 

 

President Hamilton introduced a plan to the legislature to ask them for $2.5 million per year for the next five years for Alaska-oriented research, which is about as much as the university can successfully utilize.

 

Governor  Murkowski named Carl Marrs of Anchorage, Bob Martin of Juneau and Jeff Staser of Anchorage to the University of Alaska Board of Regents. Marrs and Martin were appointed effective February 1 to terms expiring in 2013. Staser is appointed to fill the seat vacated by the resignation of Kevin Meyers. His term expires in 2007. The appointments are subject to legislative confirmation.

 

Carl Marrs is former president and CEO of CIRI. Marrs, born and raised in Seldovia, has been recognized as one of Alaska’s top business leaders. He is the recipient of the Alaska State Chamber of Commerce 2001 William A. Egan Outstanding Alaskan Award and the 2001 Alaska Federation of Natives Citizen of the Year Award. He has been involved with the United Way of Anchorage, the Resource Development Council, the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, the Boy Scouts of America, and has served on the boards of directors of many other business and non-profit organizations.

 

Bob Martin was born in Kake and raised in Kake and Juneau. He graduated from the University of Alaska with a degree in electrical engineering. He currently serves as the regional roads engineer for the Alaska Bureau of Indian Affairs. Martin served as the Director of the Southeast Region for the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities and spent 14 years in the utility industry, serving as general managers of Tlingit Haida REA and Chugach Electric. Martin is the former chairman of the Alaska Energy Authority and Goldbelt boards of directors. 

 

Jeff Staser, a fourth generation Alaskan, has served as the federal co-chairman of the Denali Commission since its inception in 1999. A 1972 graduate of West Point, he holds three masters’ degrees. Staser finished his military career as assistant director of civil works for the Army Corps of Engineers in Washington, D.C. In 1994, he began working as a legislative aide for Senator Ted Stevens. He has served on the Presidential Commission on Western Water Policy and is nationally recognized for his expertise in challenging engineering environments. He currently serves as the vice president of Commonwealth North, secretary of the Anchorage Symphony and serves on the boards of directors of other groups locally and nationally.

 

President Hamilton reflected that the public largely does not understand that the university is not a business.  Our goal is effectiveness, not efficiency.  It is good to have efficient effectiveness. But effectiveness comes first.  The idea that a person has time to participate in system governance may not be important in a factory but is important within the university and we support it.

 

President Hamilton is going to Washington tomorrow.  The university will be competing for a lot less money than before because of the war and the problems with Social Security.  President Hamilton is not going to ask for a continuation of a GI earmark in its 8th or 9th year.  He said that the US Department of Commerce and Department of Defense should be funding the earmarked items but won’t because they know Ted Stevens will stick the funding in the budget at the end.  It is the responsibility of Commerce and DOD to fund those GI earmarks.

 

The amount of state general funds the university can realistically ask for is about as much as wsa asked for.  The university can raise tuition, which is still very low at UA, but the university also contains the community college mission and our community college fees are higher than elsewhere in the nation.  President Hamilton believes that a reasonable target rate of real growth is about 1 percent per year.

 

President Hamilton mentioned that meetings with the chancellors have been very productive lately.

 

The committee to select the vice president for academic affairs has met twice.  Carol Gold chairs the committee and is doing a fine job.

 

5.                   Draft Governance Regulation; Revisions Proposed by the Board of Regents

 

Pat Ivey mentioned some revisions to the proposed governance regulation that were identified by the Board of Regents.  Wendy Redman is checking over the document and while there may be additional revisions, none  are expected to be substantive. Ivey will send the current draft out to the Council as soon as the administrative markup is completed.

           

6.         Land Bill Status  -  Joe Beedle, Vice President for Finance          

                http://www.news-miner.com/Stories/0,1413,113~7244~2716643,00.html

                http://www.legis.state.ak.us/basis/get_bill.asp?session=24&bill=HB130

 

Joe Beedle referenced two additional web sites and passed out the UA Land Grant List 2005 and two additional papers showing current status of UA lands.  The additional web sites are:

http://www.dnr.state.ak.us and http://www.ualand.com

           

SB7 actually passed several years ago and awarded 260,000 acres to the university. Current House Bill 130 actually identifies the exact lands that would be awarded.  The university actually wanted oil and gas lands on the Kenai but that request was denied by the state Department of Natural Resources (DNR).  DNR asked the university to look at foothills in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A) but the university declined.  About one-third of the lands identified by DNR will come from the Nenana Basin.  ANDEX, a natural gas exploration company is currently doing the exploration.  Old wells drilled back in the ‘80s evidenced natural gas possibilities.  Usibelli, Doyon and Artic Regional Corporation have invested in ANDEX and ANDEX will hopefully begin drilling next year.  If gas is discovered, it would benefit the university in many ways, including natural gas for its heating plant, and would generate up to $60 million per year.  The Nenana Basin property is not good for anything else; it is swampland, very permafrost-prone.  Another 90,000 acres are designated as education lands.  The university currently leases more than a million acres for research and doesn’t really need to own it.  Most of the educational lands or 53,000 acres are in the Tanana Forest.  Timber harvesters don’t want the university to have those lands because this would prevent them from harvesting the timber.  The university has negotiated with DNR for DNR to keep the land for 50 years and when it is finally transferred, we will have such a history of cooperation and multiple use that the transmittal of those lands will proceed without comment.  The university also has educational acreage for hydrology research purposes and a small parcel in Tok and Kodiak property for the rocket range.  Educational property doesn’t add to the land grant trust fund. 

 

The final third is in investment property, largely in Southeast.  The university is receiving 44 controversial parcels for investment purposes including land adjacent to villages. This is causing problems because people who testify do not have all the information and believe that the university having those lands will somehow adversely affect them.  The university has only sold 15 percent of what it owns now or 1153 parcels for $44 million plus about $40 million from timber sales.  These funds were placed in the university’s land grant trust fund, income from which yields about $5 million per year. To date, six parcels of the 1153 parcels have been sold to environmental conservation units. The other parcels went to individuals and were underwritten by the university.  The university cannot underwrite sales to 501c3 nonprofit environmental groups.

 

Because of the negative testimony on HB 130, the House Resources Committee has asked the university for additional options. On March 2, the university will offer the House Resources Committee six options and hopefully, this will satisfy committee members and allow the bill to be passed out of committee.  The university will submit a more stringent public process in the options. The state still has to defend why they are giving university some public recreation lands since DNR selected the lands and not the university.

 

7.         Financial Aid Outreach Efforts                                              

            http://www.alaska.edu/fafsafrenzy/

 

Mary Gower reported that Governor Murkowski declared February FAFSA month. The Lumina Foundation is providing $225,000 over three years to provide FAFSA outreach and training. Trainers were brought up for College Goal Sunday to give hands-on training on how to fill out the FAFSA form.  Over 700 students and families across the state participated, as compared to Massachussetts which only had 200 participants.  College Goal Sunday will be held in Alaska annually.  Fairbanks, Anchorage, Juneau, MatSu and Fort Wainwright were this year’s College Goal sites.  In future years, other outreach sites will be added.   Students who fill out the forms by the end of February are eligible for the IPod drawings.  In addition, Gower and the financial aid officers had a button campaign and open houses in Fairbanks, Anchorage and Juneau.  We sent out information sheets out to all the faculty and have a web site with links from all the MAUs and statewide main web pages. 

 

8.         System Governance Reports

 

            8.1        Faculty Alliance                                                                      

                        http://gov.alaska.edu/faculty/

 

The Alliance met two days ago, is considering policy changes to assessment and credit transfer policies, and also considered a common start date beginning August 28, 2006.  The Alliance discussed a policy on the use of invalid academic degrees. The policy is in place at UAF but UAF wants it to be a systemwide policy.  The Alliance discussed changes to appointments of distinction for faculty to bring the policy into line with current practice.  There is a technology transfer report out that lumps copyright with patents, which are two entirely different processes with their own unique sets of issues.   Alliance faculty are working on straightening that out.

 

            8.2        Staff Alliance                          

                        http://gov.alaska.edu/staff/

 

The Staff Alliance met February 8 and advised Kate Ripley about some employee communications problems.  Ripley indicated she would be meeting with Jim Johnsen to discuss the possibility of establishing an employee communications person that would be housed in the statewide Public Affairs office to address the communications problems. The Alliance also discussed problems with the UAF purchasing policy, a move to a common username standard and the IT merger.

 

            8.3        Coalition of Student Leaders                                      

                        http://gov.alaska.edu/net/

 

Closson reported that the Student Legislative Conference was very successful.  Student leaders met with legislators and approached the legislature with an attitude of gratitude and asked for funds for needs-based scholarships and the Alaska Scholars Program. Closson thanked Amber Clark and Thom Walker for their efforts in making the conference a success.

 

            8.4        Alumni Associations   

            http://www.uaaalumni.org/

                http://www.uaf.edu/alumni/index.html

                http://www.uas.alaska.edu/alumni/

 

Joe Hayes said the alumni joined with the students for the student legislative conference.  Alumni had a great time working with the 57 students who came in from all over the state.  The alumni associations held their annual ice cream social at the Capitol during the conference.  The UAF Alumni Association is holding a wine-tasting this weekend as a fundraiser. 

 

Consultants are coming to advise our alumni associations on how to strengthen all the alumni associations.  These consultants are coming the third week in March. 

 

The UAF Alumni Association is in negotiations with the chancellor at the present time to determine whether or not the association will rejoin UAF. The UAF Alumni Association is the only separate 501c3  alumni association in the state. 

By July, the UAF Alumni Association will either continue to be separate or will be reincorporated within the university.

 

David Woodley said reports from the UAA Alumni Association members who attended the student legislative conference were very positive.  The UAA Alumni Association will be having a one-day fly-in to Juneau to follow up with contacts made at the student legislative conference.   The fly-in will either be March 30 or 31 to tie in with the UA Foundation Board of Trustees. The Association is also having a raffle for two round-trip tickets to any west coast city.

 

9.         Local Governance Reports

                                               

            9.1        UAA    http://www.uaa.alaska.edu/governance/                                                                   

The UAA Assembly is working with the chancellor on a town square concept to engage the community and is developing an expert’s database.  UAA is moving toward a student-centered university that is a public squares style of operations.  See http://www.uaa.alaska.edu/news/administrative-reconfiguration.cfm.  UAA governance groups are trying to increase governance awareness on campus and will have a governance booth at the Staff Awareness Day.  Discussions about diversity and inclusion continue.  Discussions continue about establishing an ombudsman’s office, but there has not been not much action.  There is a UA and Dept of Labor survey to gauge UA’s labor practices and staff who work overtime.  Ivey explained that this was a routine audit by Department of Labor and just happened to occur right after the university had completed its self-audit of exempt and non-exempt employees.

 

9.2        UAF     http://www.uaf.edu/uafgov/

 

Paige Gingrich said ASUAF is trying to increase awareness of student government and had an event in Wood Center.  ASUAF is bringing Senator Ralph Seekins to campus on March 5.  ASUAF has had a successful recycling season and a blood drive.  Campaigns for student senate and ASUAF president are in progress.  ASUAF is looking at receiving funding to increase recycling to HESS village and has been able to divide $5000 among several student clubs.

 

UAF Staff Council will have a retreat for all members March 10.  The Staff Council had a very successful UAF half-day tour.  This tour usually fills up within a day of making the announcement.  The Council will be participating in the KUAC phone bank for fundraising and will be doing community outreach in North Pole.  The Council is still working on online elections but had to resort to paper ballots for its elections. ASUAF and the Faculty Senate may still be able to take advantage of Banner Survey to conduct electronic elections this spring.

 

The Chancellor has just signed off on a Campus Diversity Action Committee (students, staff, and faculty) with the non-administrative chair reporting to the chancellor. (In Anchorage the Dean of Students co-chairs with the HR director) At UAF, the EEO administrator will be an ex-officio member of the committee. Enrollment management is a priority topic within UAF and the Faculty Senate is getting involved.  The Faculty Senate president visited the Kuskokwin Campus in Bethel this month and attended a couple of meetings and felt it was very beneficial to see what a rural campus is all about.

 

9.3               UAS                

                http://www.uas.alaska.edu/gov/student/

                http://www.uas.alaska.edu/staffcouncil/

                http://www.uas.alaska.edu/FacultySenate/

 

Rita Fuller reported that at the last Staff Council meeting, Tom Dienst, UAS head of HR addressed the Council. For the first time, the Staff Council is requesting a budget and will be holding elections in April.  Elections will be online.  Hopefully the draft Council budget will be completed by April 15.

 

            9.4        Statewide                    

            http://gov.alaska.edu/saa/

 

Statewide Administration Assembly will contribute to the March of Dimes campaign and is working on revising the Butrovich Building maps.  Statewide phone numbers are still changing.  Nominations are still open for SAA elections and for outstanding statewide employee awards.

10.        Comments

 

Steadman said that the governance link should be more visible.  The governance web page is currently buried under the Administration link. 

 

MOTION:  passed without objection

 

“The System Governance Council moves that the governance web link be moved back to the main www.alaska.edu web page.  This action is effective February 24, 2004.”

 

11.                Adjourn

 

The meeting was adjourned at 2:58pm.