Auburn University Senate Meeting

April 6, 2004

Minutes

 

 

Members Absent:  Dan Bennett, Dean, College of Architecture;  John Jensen, Interim Dean, College of Agriculture;  Sheri Downer, Interim Dean of Libraries;  Bradford Boney, SGA President;  Martha Taylor, A&P Assembly Chair;  William Gale, Steering Committee;  Leanne Lamke, Steering Committee;  Jefferson Jones, Accountancy;  Mario Lightfoote, ACES;  John  Pittari, Jr., Architecture;  Barry Fleming, Art;  Raymond Hamilton, Aviation Management & Logistics;  Joe Cherry, Biological Sciences;  Scott Kramer, Building Sciences;  Rik Blumenthal, Chemistry;  Sridhar Krishnamurti, Communication Disorders;  Alvin Sek See Lim, Computer Science & Software Engineering;  Ann Presley, Consumer Affairs;  Renée Middleton, Counseling & Counseling Psychology;  Gary Martin, Curriculum & Teaching;  Randy Beard, Economics;  Jon Bolton, English;  Jim Saunders, Geology & Geography;  David Pascoe, Health & Human Performance;  Ken Tilt, Horticulture;  Tin-Man Lau, Industrial Design;  Saeed Maghsoodloo, Industrial Engineering;  Hugh Guffey, Marketing;  Daniel Mackowski, Mechanical Engineering;  Richard Good, Music;  John Rowe, Nursing;  Jack DeRuiter, Pharmacal Sciences;  Kem Krueger, Pharmacy Care Systems;  Charles Taylor, Pharmacy Practice;     Richard Penaskovic, Philosophy;  Marllin Simon, Physics;  Christa Slaton, Political Science;  Robert Norton, Poultry Science;  Thomas White, ROTC Air Force;  LTC John Salvetti, ROTC Army;  Paul Starr, Sociology/Anthropology/Social Work;  Howard Thomas, Textile Engineering;  Tracey Oleinick, Theatre;  Saralyn Smith-Carr, Veterinary Clinical Sciences

 

Members Absent (Substitute):  Fran Kochan, Interim Dean, College of Education (Bob Rowsey);  Emmett Winn, Communication & Journalism (David Sutton);  Dennis DeVries, Fisheries & Allied Aquaculture (John Grizzle) 

 

Call to Order:  The meeting was called to order at 3:00 p.m. by the Chair, Willie Larkin.

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  May I have your attention please?  If you’ll get your seats—in all fairness to those persons who showed up on time, I call the April 6 Senate Meeting to order.  You should have had an opportunity to review the minutes on the senate web page.  Are there any corrections to those minutes as posted?  Those minutes stand approved. 

 

Our first order of business is to invite Dr. Ed Richardson, our Interim President, to come and give the State of the University address.  This was supposed to happen in March but because the Board was meeting shortly after that meeting, he asked that we delay that until this particular date. 

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President  -  Thank you, Dr. Larkin.  Actually I was hoping that I would at least have a month on the job before I could give you a comprehensive review of the University and, now that I have two months, perhaps I can offer some insight.  I would say, on a serious note, it certainly would be very presumptuous of me after a little over two months on the job to offer you a comprehensive assessment of Auburn University.  But since I have a narrowly defined role as Interim President, I would like to address a few topics that, hopefully, would be of mutual interest and then respond to any questions that you might have.

 

First issue is foremost in my mind—and I’m sure on yours as well—and that deals with SACS probation.  And we’ve talked about that during a previous meeting.  I would simply like to give you a progress report as to where we are and, hopefully, give you some encouraging news.  This is my number one priority and since we now have about another four or five weeks in which to respond to the complaints that were filed, we will be compiling our answers to that and certainly we will make those available to you once we have those in form to send to SACS.  But I want to assure you that I consider this to be a blot on Auburn’s record and, as I have said previously, I have never been involved with an institution that’s been on probation and I don’t intend to end my career with an institution on probation.  So I’m going to do all that I can to remove that.  And there is going to be some interesting developments, I’m sure, over the next two months and I would like to elaborate on those just a little bit in these comments.

 

First, I have asked for an extension from SACS from the deadline previously established of April 22nd until May 14th.  The reason for that is not that we need additional time but since we have a  meeting on May 7th, I felt like it would be better to offer to SACS what had been done rather than what we intend to do.  And so that was the purpose of the delay.  I have not received approval of that but I intend to call Dr. Rogers tomorrow to see if there are any problems with that.

 

The May 7th meeting of the Trustees will be interesting in several respects because it will pertain to SACS.

 

(Cell phone ringing:  Dr. Richardson apologized and answered)  Just since we’ve already been distracted—by the way, they were calling me from the Senate and our two new Board members were confirmed just a few minutes ago so we’ve got two more that—(33 to nothing) and so I’m assuming it was some follow-up along those lines.

 

Back to May 7th.  This is a meeting to accomplish two things.  First, we’ll start our discussion with some of the major policy issues associated with a long-term financial security of Auburn University.  But, for the purpose of SACS—which is the point that I’m addressing at this time, I would say to you that it is the time that I’m going to put on the table two or three recommendations.  The first one pertains to a conflict of interest relative to Boards of Trustees and policy.  I believe that, based on looking at other institutions attending the Association of Governing Boards Meeting last week and asking SACS to review, I will be able to have a policy that I think will address that more fully.  The one that’s giving me the most difficulty, and I believe we will also have ready—in fact it is my intention to have it ready by May 7th—is to have someway of determining how we can prevent one or two or three Board members from having undue influence on the majority, which is a specific citation in the charge by SACS. 

 

One of the ways that institutions work in that regard is not only to have the conflict-of-interest policy, which I will ask for their adoption on the 7th, but also to adopt a new committee called an Audit Committee.  The Audit Committee will serve, again, at least two broad purposes in my view.  The first one is  it’s part of the outgrowth of Enron and WorldCom and so forth to make sure Boards of Trustees are not being deceived by CEO’s and that is they will be more closely involved in selecting auditors and reviewing the audit reports to make sure it accurately reflects the financial situation of the institution.  But, in terms of SACS, it is also a committee that would have a second purpose and that is to review any type of financial dealings among or between Board members so that, if there was again something that would affect the decisions, this audit committee could call the Board members in and inform them that that had to stop.  So I believe that those two policies—and I don’t anticipate that will be unanimously approved but I would anticipate that it would accomplish the objective if I’m successful in getting it through and I believe that will be the case.  So for the May 7th meeting then we will start the policy decision but the first thing in my report will deal with SACS and those policies.  I just wanted to add one other thing and this really deals with what is it going to take to really set the stage to start a search for a permanent president.  I believe that we must establish a pattern of behavior.  I would say to you by passing these policies and then walking away I assure you the new person would not have a real good chance of success.  So I believe that if we can get these policies approved and committed and then enforced, which I intend to do the best I can over the next several months I believe that pattern of behavior will be more effective and I would say with now having five new Board of Trustees on I think that it will be easier as well.  So, that in terms of SACS, May 7th will be an interesting meeting. 

 

c. – as part of SACS – (c. on my notes) I think the other one deals with athletics and I will have to tell you that I’m spending about 30% of my time on athletics and that’s about 25% more than I wish to.  And I’m learning a lot about athletics and we’ve got some good people here but I would have to tell you that’s the area that will require more attention than even the other issue to which I previously referred.  I would say the issue is whether or not the President is in control of both  athletics and the finances and I assure you that by the May 14th deadline that one will be in place.  We are, as you may know—if you’ve read some of the papers and have any interest—interviewing candidates for the men’s basketball program at this time.  I feel very good about the final two that we have and I hope by the end of the week we will be able to make an announcement and that’s a decision between Mr. Beard and myself and we’ll make that decision and I think that will set the tone for the women’s search which will start, hopefully, the next week and then a little bit later this fall with an athletic director.  I want to say in regard to Trustees—I really have been greatly encouraged by the Trustees acceptance of the role of President.  I really have. I’ve even had one call and say, “Look, if I’ve done the wrong thing”—in this case a coach had called him and said, “I want to meet with you”.  I’ll just be quite frank with you, that’s totally unacceptable to me and the Board member said, “I haven’t and I’m calling you to see.”  I said “No” and he said, “Then I’ll tell him no”.  So I really believe that with the right atmosphere, in which we don’t get too accusatory but we just move forward and we clearly establish what we are about, I think you are going to see a very positive movement which will serve this institution well in the future.  As I said, the two new commissioners, Virginia Thompson from Opelika—I guess she’s Opelika, she works at East Alabama Medical Center and I’m not sure where she lives—and Charles McCrary, CEO of Alabama Power—they were confirmed about fifteen minutes ago. So they will be available then for the May 7th meeting and I think that will help us to get off to a good start because now we will have almost  half of our Trustees that will be new within the last few months.  In that regard, I would say that we will have another orientation session for Trustees on May 6th.  We are not quite sure of the format, other than it will go from about 10:00 until 4:00 but, now that we’ve got one group that’s been through the first one and the other group that has not we are going to have to try to play “catch-up” there and I would anticipate that the morning session will be devoted to the two new ones and the afternoon session to everyone and , hopefully, then we can make sure they  understand the intent of those policies to which I previously referred and why we are having some problems.  One thing I would say is that this agenda will be developed over the next two weeks.  Last time, John Mouton, the smiling past-president of this group, participated and actually talked about faculty, the faculty day, and I’m sure, Dr. Larkin, you will be participating and I’m asking for your participation on May 6th and we will get together soon to try to establish time-lines and what needs to be done.  I think it is essential that the Trustees, as well as a broader arena of people, of constituency, understand what constitutes the normal life of a professor—that is not two courses and out-of-here type of thing which many people think.  And I think that when you look at the other things that take up your time—research and all the rest—I think it’s very important that the Trustees understand.  Because as we look at issues associated with faculty numbers—that was one citation in our SACS report in terms of the College of Liberal Arts having more students than they need in terms of the faculty—that as we look at that it will be very helpful for them to understand that there is more to faculty life than a couple of courses.  Now, I want to say to you—on May 17th and June 11th  we will have Trustees meetings—June 11th is our annual meeting in which we elect the pro-tem and we also appoint members of the various committees and that’s when the Audit Committee comes up and I hope that the Chair Pro-tem, Earlon McWhorter, who has been very helpful to me, will work with me on some of those committees that I really believe were perhaps appropriate yesterday but not appropriate today and I hope that we can clean that up so that it will help us, particularly in the area of athletics, and again that reflects back on my intent to look at the SACS report.  I would say that those two meetings will be devoted  primarily—other than the policies—but the one certainly on June 11th (and we should have another orientation session on June 10th Dr. Larkin) will be devoted to looking at those aspects of the operation of Auburn University.  I want to make sure in terms of commitments so that I don’t mislead you in saying that—well, here they go again.  Do we need this department or that department—that’s not the type of discussion that I anticipate occurring but I would like to talk to you about commitments.  As we go into these discussions, and I’ll get to the commitment next, I want you to stay involved and I would like for you to provide input into those discussions.  When we get to the end of it I really think the mission of the university will be modified to reflect that and certainly our priorities will change as a result of that.  I do not anticipate that these decisions will be made by June 11th.  In fact I anticipate most will go on into the fall and, hopefully, be concluded by the end of this calendar year.  But the one on June 11th, which is our annual meeting, the ones dealing with budget priorities for fiscal year ‘05 will be determined and so there will be a heavier focus in that regard. 

 

Commitments:  When we had the commission of some years ago, when we looked at this, and I know it created heartburn for a lot of people and I acknowledge that I was co-chair of that and I really believe all-in-all it came out reasonably well.  I would say that we made three commitments and that was at my suggestion, and I would ask that you listen to the commitments and then if you disagree then perhaps in a question and answer session we can deal with it.  We heard that salaries were not competitive—I believe that to be the case.  I think some gains have been made, relatively speaking, but as we go forward into this discussion I want you to know that that will remain a priority as we look at the budget for FY 05.  When you spend money in one area obviously sometimes you squeeze others so I want to let you know that is a commitment.  We also have a commitment to deferred maintenance and we want to continue to add to that amount because as we add buildings we are eventually going to create some very serious problems for ourselves if we don’t.  The one that I would like to commit to—and you will not be cut—but the one that you may have some concern about is what I would call—what you have told me you call departmental maintenance or I think operations, I’ve heard a second, and I assume those are the same items.  We will not cut those but I’m not as optimistic we will be able to increase those.  The first two—salaries and deferred maintenance—we hope to add something above what is currently budgeted.  I trust that we will stay the same in departmental but not be able to increase that.  There are going to be some trade-offs, but I believe that we can do that without compromising integrity in this program.  I would like to digress from my notes just a little bit to talk to you about the strength of this institution—not to give you some of the things you read in the newspapers and all that, which are nice, but as we have looked at basketball coaches—and I’m talking about some from superior institutions with superior pedigree in terms of coaching as well as academics—it became quite clear to me as they reviewed the institution that they were very impressed with Auburn University and, as of Saturday, I could have had my pick, if you will.  The only thing that’s really got us in a bind is that NCAA business and we tried to find out—when are you gonna let us know.  Last Friday was the end of the seventh week—they said they would let us know between five and seven weeks and we still do not know and we won’t know this week.  That’s the only thing we got out of them—you won’t know this week.  So what I just wanted you to know that these people were very impressed with the institution and I trust that you are equally confident that by addressing just a few of these issues—although they are going to be thorny—there are going to be some people unhappy about some of these issues and involvement in activities and so forth.  I’m quite confident those can be cleared up and I’m quite confident this institution will flourish in the years to come.  So I just want to offer that encouragement.  It was just amazing to me how many of these people from Duke and North Carolina and other institutions were quite complimentary of this institution. 

 

Another area that we need to deal with and since I—a couple of months ago—was wearing a different hat, I want to talk to you about issues dealing with tuition increases and dwindling state funds.  First, on the positive side, I do believe that the initial projections for the trust fund were understated and I believe at least we will break even rather than have a 5% or 6% cut, which Don anticipated and I anticipated to tell you the truth.  So that’s progress.  You might say we didn’t get any increase but it certainly beats 5% cut.  So I think that in that regard state funding will be a little better this year and, hopefully, even better the following year.

 

I made one trip last Thursday to the Legislature with several things in mind—one of which was to insure that our two nominees would be confirmed as I talked with a Chair there.  But I want to talk to you about something that we might as well face up to.  If we are going to improve or eliminate the continual bleeding—if you will—in terms of loss of state funds, we’ve got to approach it in a different way.  And I would like to just give you a comparison of the approach that it will take if we are to make inroads and I believe we can do that.  I believe within a year or two that those funds can be increased and I hope this next session around you will see evidence of that. Let me just talk about how it works.  In my previous position, we established our priorities in the summer—in June or July.  Then we met with all the legislative leadership—governor, speaker, pro-tem, lieutenant governor, all those of the budget and the money committees and so forth—in October.  After we came to some agreement with the legislative fiscal office on revenues and what we could reasonably project, we left and came back in December and talked about specific priorities—in this case for K-12.  We had gone back a third time in early January to refine our presentations.  And the week that I started here was to be my fourth visit with that same group.  What I’m trying to say to you—we had four intensive meetings with specific objectives on the table prior to the start of the regular session of the legislature.  If you wait till the legislative session starts, forget it—and that’s been the Auburn model.  I would tell you—and I stand as your interim president of two months or so—if you were to ask me now what is our legislative priority, other than—give us more money—I could not answer the question, and I don’t know if you could either.  We’ve got to reach some consensus in that regard—we’ve got to start early and we’ve got to push very hard.  Auburn has some credibility in the legislature because its had a presence in many years, as not all the counties in the state.  But, I would say to you, we have not used it—in fact it’s been my perception – it’s almost as if its dirty work and we don’t want to go it.  I’ll admit, you do get dirty sometimes but on the other hand that doesn’t mean you have to compromise your integrity and it does mean that the end result in this case should resolve in some additional funding.  So that’s the plan I ask that you keep in mind because you say, “Well, what are you telling me”.  Well, in two months we’ve got to identify our priorities so we can start the discussion with the next set of legislative leaders.  And so I ask that you give that some thought and I’m sure we will have an opportunity to discuss it.  We will try to also gather as much support in that area as we can in terms of lobbying and so forth because you’ve just got to get in there and get after it.  And so you may say, “Well, here we go again”.  But I would say to you this is a multiple year proposition and the more contacts that we can make the more our relationship can develop and blossom and the more likely we are to be successful with the legislature.  Now keep in mind we had two very influential legislators on the Board for a number of years—the Pro-tem of the senate and Chair of the Rules Committee are no small tasks.  Those are very choice assignments and we did not get any improvement.  I’m not blaming them.  That’s our fault, because we did not decide what it is we wanted and specifically define it and go after it and push it before the session started.  So, we need to work on that.  I think we also need to keep in mind that this is a problem that’s not going to go away.  I’m sure you’ve read, as I have, about Colorado—the legislature working to say that the university should be totally privately funded and not with state funds at all.  I was informed today that the South Carolina governor has agreed to give all the buildings to the universities if they want to become private and so I think we’re seeing a shift in priority.  I think those priorities are skewed because of the financial conditions and although I spent all of my career in K-12 I would tell you, without hesitation, the only hope for Alabama is a strong higher education system—do we have too much—do we have duplications—Yes and Yes.  But that’s the only hope we’ve got.  And I would say to you, we’ve got to strengthen higher education—we’ve got to sell it—and I believe we can.  I think economic development and the education of our people certainly should be persuasive. 

 

One final thing I would offer—I was very startled when I spent some time with our SACS committee chair member, Dr. Kasteen, and he was very helpful to me, by the way—I was glad that he could spend some time with me.  But he revealed to me that only 8% of his budget at the University of Virginia is derived from state funds—8 – zero 8.  And so I would say to you, we can see Alabama, as a poor state with rampant problems in Medicaid and corrections and so forth, continually being squeezed in that direction so we’ve got to make a stronger case because at some point you have to decide how far can tuition carry us.  I think we have two choices—I think, Don, that’s what you told me—we have basically state funds and we have tuition and if the state funds go down, obviously, the other has to go up.  So I think this is going to be a problem with us for a long time to come and I believe we can set the stage over the next couple of years and, if we make that commitment to work in advance, I’m optimistic that we will have some very positive results.  The only other area that I think we can accumulate some additional money to come back into the major part of this institution is that we’ve got to look at some—what I would call—secondary programs that are costing us money that we need to look at whether or not we want to spend three or four million dollars doing that.  And I’m going to tell you I’m going to be hard to convince that, if it’s not directly related to the academic program, that we need to be spending three or four million dollars doing that.  So I think you are going to see a lot of discussions on those—there is going to be a constituency with each one of those groups and they are going to want to tell us why this president’s gone crazy but I would tell you that that’s another source and I think we need to look very carefully at that. 

 

In summary:  Auburn University’s financial condition is in the best shape that it’s been in its history.  You might say, “Well, why are you talking about that?”  That’s the reason we are talking about that.  If we don’t make incremental changes over the next three to five years our condition will look substantially different five years from now than it does now.  I mean it’s just like anybody else.  You have good income and everything’s fine and then your twin daughters are going to college.  Your financial condition changes.  And so we are looking at issues that are impacting on us, whether it’s health care, energy cost—all of those issues are going to impact upon us.  So we want to make incremental changes over the next three to five years so that the impact will not be so severe and we can just gradually tighten up.  That’s the model that we want to follow.

 

Enrollment:  One of the good things about enrollment is that we’ve got more highly qualified students—and John you can confirm that—that want to come to Auburn.  And I can confirm it because I have so many friends that I didn’t realize that I had that want me to get their son or daughter in school.  I’ve even had four or five visit me to assure me how good friends we were and could I help them.  I have not done that but I would tell you that there is a lot of interest in getting into Auburn.  We are trying to build a campus that would accommodate 25,000 students—that’s graduate and undergraduate—and I believe that’s large enough.  And I would tell you that if we just accepted the students that meet the qualifications now for the freshmen we would be at that figure.  It would be a disaster to accept them all at once and we will not but I want you to know that we’re going to move to that direction so I think the enrollment and the attraction speaks very well of Auburn.  I would say to you this—there is an inverse correlation here that state funding—it doesn’t matter how many students you have—you get the same amount.  The best way to increase your financial condition is to reduce—and this is what I said to the Board—by about 3000 students.  Just cut them out.  When you increase students you get the same amount of money but actually creates a financial squeeze for the institution.  There is a formula that was developed by the Commission on Higher Ed—it’s just not followed and hasn’t been followed for ten years.  So I want to say to you that’s an issue that we have to keep in mind.  Campaign officer, Bob McGinnis here, is ahead of schedule and I feel very confident that we will reach the goal that has been set and I really think that that’s a critical feature in terms of our financial security.  We must have an endowment that is much larger than we currently enjoy.  I want to say—make an obvious statement—most of it you might say, “Well we knew all that to begin with” but I’ll make another one in that case—that the more dissention we have on the campus the more difficult it is to raise those funds.  Now, that doesn’t mean we can’t have opposition—can’t have differences of opinion—that’s what I’m trying to get with the staff at Samford Hall.  I mean we’ve got to have some hard direct discussions based on issues and not based on personalities.  I think if we could have the discussion based on issues I really believe we could still enjoy the differences of opinion—and I’m not saying you can’t do it, I mean obviously I couldn’t stop you anyway, but what I am saying is that that is an impediment to us attracting the people that we want as well as the money.  Now one observation I would offer to you and this is the observation that I’ve based on my two months and one week—or whatever I’ve been here.  I think the major problem that I find here at Auburn is not that our students aren’t strong—exceptionally strong.  I’m just glad I don’t have to compete against them as a student cause I wouldn’t even make it—a faculty that is just stunning, and I say that—I don’t offer compliments easily—but I’m greatly impressed with the faculty and a lot of other people are too, I can tell you that.  But the observation that I would make is that many people have lost sight of the primary objective and that is the further improvement of Auburn University—not the president, not the trustees, not the alumni—and I would say from observation we still have people putting personal ambition, organizational interests and past animosities first and that’s not going to help us accomplish our objectives.  I think if I’m to be successful in establishing a pattern of behavior that will be conducive to the attraction and selection of a permanent president more people will have to put Auburn first.  This will not be easy nor occur overnight but I think putting Auburn first will be mutually beneficial and enable all of us to succeed in our professional endeavors.  I’m confident that if I’m here, that if asked to offer a report next spring, you will see dramatic changes and improvements and hopefully you will be much more optimistic about this great institution that we all love.  Thank you so much, Dr. Larkin

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  Please, just to remind that the only reason I stood up is you said, “In conclusion” but that was—(laughter and President Richardson laughed and remarked, “about 10 minutes ago?”) —that was about 10 paragraphs early.  So the next time you need to wait until you get about four sentences and then say, “In conclusion.”

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  So you fell for that trick too?

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  Yes I did.  We’ll entertain questions.  Why don’t you field your own questions and that may expedite things.

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  Great.  Conner?  Larry Gerber—I’m sorry, my glasses.  I’m sorry Larry.

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  Do me a favor, Larry and come to the microphone.  If you plan to speak get up now if you will and go to one of the microphones.

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  Excuse me.  Both have a beard and I missed you, sorry Larry.

 

Larry Gerber, History:  That’s all right.  I just have a brief question about the SACS procedure from this point.  I thought I had read that there was going to be a special investigating team coming at the end of April.

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  That’s true.  September to October.  They haven’t set a date but they will still come on campus and will still look at the report I have offered, talk to people to see if in fact it accurately represents the situation here at Auburn.

 

Larry Gerber, History:  So it’s on September or October.

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  September or October—we have not set the date.  In fact – Linda?  Is Linda Glaze here?  It’s something like mid September—that’s the time frame.  But  they will be here, you will have an opportunity to talk to them and, of course, you will have an opportunity to look at the report that I have submitted as well.

 

Melissa Brooks, GSC President:  At the last Faculty Senate Meeting you said that  you would look into the demolition of Caroline Draughon Village.  What decisions have been made since then?

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  Well, I did—what I said was, I would get you the reasons that were offered to me—I did and I submitted those to Dr. Larkin as I indicated that I would.  Again the reasons that I offered were—there were those that repeated:  The cost of maintaining those apartments were far higher than any other set that we had and it was just prohibitive in terms of maintaining those.  They were just going to have to shut down—and I wouldn’t say all of them, but a good number of those.  I think the other issue that was offered is that there were, and I realize that Conner mentioned something last time that maybe two or three hundred students may not seem a lot in the scheme of things but that’s two or three hundred groups of people that are affected and that those were the two reasons offered.  As far as the change in plans—there have been no changes in the plans.

 

Melissa Brooks, GSC President:  And what are the solutions that have been offered up for the students living there?

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  I can’t answer that other than there are—Christine?  Can you answer—Dr. Curtis?  She knows more about it than I do.

 

Christine Curtis, Special Assistant to the President:  Bob Ritenbaugh is really the person who should be answering this question, or Kim Trupp, but I will tell you what I know.  Kim Trupp and several of the housing people worked with the City of Auburn and the realtors in Auburn and have had a session with the students and have tried to develop a working relationship with the realtors so that the students could get the best housing available at a reasonable price, early, and they are going to be working with the students so that if they need to leave early they will release them from the lease—if they need to leave a little bit later they’ll extend their time.  So there has been a lot of conversation, a lot of working with the students to help them find appropriate housing that is within their economic range.

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  You have a follow-up on that?  Okay.  Thank you Dr. Curtis.

 

I guess this is Larry, right?

 

Conner Bailey, Chair-Elect:  He may not want to be associated with this question because I fear that this may be interpreted as one of those dissenting views, and it’s not my intent at all.  I’m sure you don’t want to have just soft balls lobbed at you and you wouldn’t expect that anyway.

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  A waste of time.

 

Conner Bailey, Chair-Elect:  The question I want to raise has to do with the termination of the Vice President for Alumni Affairs, Betty DeMent, and we all want to have Auburn first and move this institution forward.  We all recognize probation is the central concern—that’s how you stated it and I’m sure everybody in this room absolutely agrees.  We all know that the academic site of the house is not the issue, the site of the house that is the issue has to do with governance and the role of the board and perhaps certain Board members and it’s walking around knowledge—I can’t give you any factual documents behind this—but it’s walking around knowledge that a certain member of the Board of Trustees has campaigned or has had it strongly associated with that individual that that individual wanted Betty DeMent out of that office and so this is an opportunity, sir, if you would to assure the public and this body that no trustee had any influence on you making this decision and I think perhaps the best way of answering that was if you would tell us why you felt it in Auburn’s best interest, at a time critical to our capital campaign, to remove the Vice President for Alumni Affairs?

 

Ed Richardson, Interim President:  That’s a fair question, Conner, but I can’t go into all the details for the obvious reasons.  There still may be a suit and so I will have to dance around the issue a little bit.  So I would say, let me answer the first part of the question.  You know—here I come in January—you may have seen me when I was here ten years ago but you really don’t know that much about me.  The only way this institution is going to get back on even keel is for, what I would describe as institutional control to be a well-established definition and method of operation.  I assure you that I talked to each individual Board member before I accepted this position and I said it publicly, if you were at the meeting, that I would run the show.  Now, I want to just make sure you don’t misunderstand me—I, representing the administrative structure of the university, not individually.  And that’s the way it’s going to be.  And that’s why the next two months are going to be a little bumpy.  To answer your question—there was no trustee involvement with Mr. Housel, with Ms. DeMent or with Cliff Ellis—none.  And the coach that I hope to announce later this week, I have not talked to one trustee nor do I intend to.  And I think that’s the only way.  Now Hal Baird and I are talking.  But that’s the only way that we can set the stage that the president is going to be in charge and that for the person who replaces me to have a decent chance.  So, be assured, that’s not.  Now, to acknowledge your point—are there people on the Board of Trustees that are very unhappy with Ms. DeMent?  Yes, no question about that.  And I would say to you, I not only spoke to the Alumni group, I went before the Alumni Board and spoke with them and basically said that we had to take certain steps and that for those that were committed to Auburn, that it was going to be fine but for those that I felt were either making improper decisions or were not committed to Auburn but were committed to personal agenda it was not going to be pleasant.  And it was sort of a joke a couple of weeks ago—don’t go to his office this week, type of routine.  But I don’t like that—you have to do it.  But it is not something that I enjoy.  In fact, it is with some agony that you make those decisions because you affect so many people and I have had to do that over the years and it’s just not pleasant.  But I would say to you that the Alumni Association was almost at the last step of being so estranged from the University that it was going to be out there by itself with no support.  I mean there was only one other step to take.  I don’t believe that’s the correct decision.  I believe the Alumni Association and Auburn University ought to be tied together and we ought to be focusing on the improvement of Auburn University.  So, I’ve had conversations with Ms. DeMent, as I did with Mr. Housel and as I did with Coach Ellis and I based the decision on those general criteria that identified without any—now again, were there one or two Board of Trustees who maybe they were happy about—probably all three of them to tell you the truth—probably, yes.  But, I’m not here to do anything other than to set the stage for the permanent president to have a chance.  That’s what I’m going to do.  It’s not fatal if I don’t make it.  That’s one of the reasons I’m willing to take the risk and I’m not going to compromise myself at the tale-end of my career.  So, I would tell you the next two months will be bumpy in terms of trustees and committees and assignments—I’ve got some people that are already unhappy but that’s just the way it’s going to be and I’m going to have to make some other decisions that won’t be that high profile but I am deliberately leaving the trustees out and can you imagine the curiosity about “who in the world are you going to appoint for the basketball coach?”  I mean, that’s a high priority for some of them—they don’t know and I’m not saying and, hopefully, by the end of this week able to identify the candidate that I think will accept then they will learn about the same time the media does.  But as far as in more details for Ms. DeMent I would just say I couldn’t go further.

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  Are there any other questions.  Thank you very much.  You’re off the hot seat.    (Round of applause)

 

I’m going to make some very brief comments about my activities since we met last.  A week before I assumed this role I did fly on the Auburn University plane to Tampa, Florida to speak to the Auburn Club.  It was not a recruitment junket or anything like that.  There were several other people that went along on the trip.  It was an official trip representing the University but I thought you needed to know that.

 

I’ve had an opportunity to visit with the Steering Committee.  I like the makeup of that committee.  I like the openness and this particular agenda here is the result of their input.  Also I’ve met with the Rules Committee.  Again, I like the makeup, the cooperation that we received from them.  Each one of the committees—once we met we outlined our operating procedures and how we would interact with each other and so I feel very good about the work that both of those committees are going to have.  Next week the Executive Committee and the five of the officers will meet and we will start our work.  But I wanted to make a couple of suggestions or recommendations for making the senate operate just a little better.  I’m not fussing or anything like this, I’m offering these just as suggestions.  I’m encouraging all senators to please copy and read the minutes and agenda from the senate webpage before they attend the meetings.  I recommend that you receive input on the issues from your constituents that you represent before you come and, if possible bring the copy of the agenda to the meetings.  We will have some on the back but if you will bring your copy—the ones that you have notes on—that will kind of make things work better.  All senators should sit in the designated areas and those areas will be marked before each meeting.  Guests and representatives from the press and media are asked to sit on these first two rows as well as the back two rows.  We request that all speakers go to the microphone, once you are there please state your name and department that you represent and this request is only made to allow us to record accurate comments for the minutes.  We realize that not all ideas can be captured in the time frame allotted for our senate meetings so if you came in and signed in you noticed that there was a suggestion box in the back and we also have the little slips that you can make comments and put them in that suggestion box.  We encourage you to do that.  The other thing is that my parliamentarian for this year is Bill Saucer.  Bill is just basically going to respond to issues that require him to give me some input on parliamentary procedure type thing.  And I’ll read this very quickly in terms of the job description:  it simply says that the parliamentarian is appointed by the senate chair and is an ex-officio member of the senate leadership team.  The parliamentarian will be responsible for making sure that appropriate parliamentary procedure based on Robert’s Rules of Order, Newly Revised 10th Edition is followed in all regularly scheduled and specially called faculty and senate meetings.  The parliamentarian will provide protocol and parliamentary procedure recommendations to the senate chair.  The parliamentarian shall maintain a copy of Auburn University Senate By-Laws for every meeting.  And then if you picked up a copy of this parliamentary Motions Guide,  it’s a front and back type cheat sheet and it’s very important that if you’ll look to the far left it says what you want to do.  If you want to close a meeting, if you want to take a break, register a complaint and it goes on and on and these are in the order of precedence.  And then the next column says:  You say, “I move to do such and such.”  You don’t say things like, “I authorize, suggest, I recommend a motion”, or anything like this.  You simply say, “I move” and then you state whatever your motion is.  It indicates whether you can interrupt the speaker—it indicates whether it requires a second or not—it suggests whether it can be debated or not and then it recommends whether it can be amended or not and then the vote that’s required.  Our by-laws require different votes on certain things and if they differ from that when we get ready to address a particular issue we will indicate that in advance so that you will know those particular special circumstances.

 

A couple of other things:  We have a sergeant-at-arms for the first time.  That person is Ralph Foster and I want to read very quickly what that responsibility is:  The Sergeant-at-Arms is appointed by the senate chair and is an ex-officio member of the senate leadership team with facilitative and administrative responsibilities.  The Sergeant-at-arms provides support to the Chair and officers in the planning and conduct of all regularly scheduled and specifically called faculty senate meetings.  He or she assists guests and other external speakers appearing before the faculty senate.  He or she is responsible for the placement and collection of the senate suggestion box and performs other duties as assigned.  This position is not an enforcement position and although Ralph is a fairly big fellow he’s not going to wrestle anybody to the ground or anything like that.  His job, basically, is to help me facilitate the operation proceedings of the meeting.  During discussions and debates I encourage you to direct all questions through the Chair.  The next item is that I’m going to put on the senate web site a senate chair update and every other week I will put on that update the things that I’m engaged in as I represent the faculty and the senate.  And then the final comment that I will make is that all senate meetings for 2004 and 2005 are now posted on the senate web page and you can refer to that and copy those and place those on your schedule. 

 

Now, I need to have Dr. Hanley to come up and he’s going to talk about the revised Vision and Mission Statement.  Unlike Dr. Richardson, he does not have unlimited time. 

 

(Ralph was called on to bring the file up on the screen)

 

Tom Hanley, Provost:  While he’s pulling this up—Okay, it’s up ---------  Anyway, it’s part of the SACS study.  We had a SACS Committee that looked at the Vision and Mission Statements of the University and made recommendations.  The recommendations for the Vision Statement—and I’m trying to get those pulled up now.  I had it in an edited form where it would show you what the edit marks are but the major edit in the Vision Statement is----not up there.  (That might be an older version, I don’t know.  Let me see if I can find it.  How much time do I have to look?)

 

If you look at the Vision Statement, the changes that were recommended are the two underlined red changes which adds the word “comprehensive” between “pre-eminent” and “land-grant” and changes the third sentence to read, “The University will widely be recognized for the quality of it’s undergraduate, graduate and professional education programs.”  In the Mission Statement, the second paragraph was re-arranged.  The whole paragraph was re-written but, in short, what the changes were were it placed undergraduate, graduate and professional education on the same level in the University Mission Statement.  The Committee recommended that this Mission Statement be approved—this Vision Statement and Mission statement be approved.  I took it to the Planning and Priorities Commission.  President Richardson has charged us with looking at that on a yearly basis and so we looked at it and approved the changes in total.  We then took it to the Provost Council where the deans and the provost viewed this and again approved it as it was and so I forwarded this to Willie and the Senate Steering Committee to bring to you for your recommendation.  The next step with your recommendation would be to take this to the President and then to the Trustees for approval and officially change both the Vision and the Mission Statements to reflect these changes.  Again, the changes add the word “comprehensive” in the Vision Statement and to equate the importance of undergraduate, graduate and professional education on campus.

 

Willie Larkin, Chair – Questions—Are there any questions—please go to the mike, state your name and the department you represent.

 

Cindy Brunner, Pathobiology:  Dr. Hanley, due to my mishandling of the announcement of the agenda for this meeting, I didn’t have an opportunity to discuss these changes with my department but I think I could forecast their reaction and it would be that they would be very pleased with the proposed changes.  I think that the changes have addressed the very issues that have annoyed us the most since the approval of our current Vision and Mission Statement.

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  Other questions.?

 

Tom Hanley, Provost:    No other questions then I would just ask Chair Larkin to see if we can get a recommendation from the University Senate so we can have this to the Trustees by the next meeting, which would be in May.

 

One more announcement, if I can.  Just to bring everybody up to speed, I told you about the various studies we were doing—the capacity study is finished.  It will go out to the chairs and the deans probably this afternoon or tomorrow.  What it shows, is that—let me frame this first before somebody starts getting the wrong idea about this.  The question was:  Is how many more students can you take in the various classes that you have with no additional resources?  And the answer to this question, if we put them in exactly the right place, it turns out to be about 9%.  And so we are looking at about 500 graduate students and about 1500 undergraduate students that can be added.  The interesting thing about it is that we’re about 98% full according to the department chairs with the freshman level but we’re running about 87% and 83%  at the sophomore and junior years and running about 80% in both the masters and the PhD programs.  So where we have room right now in the undergraduate program is at the sophomore and junior year.  And so I’m going to take this and I’m going to try to get Dr. Williams to come up with a plan on how we can do two things:  No. one:  one of the objectives we are talking about is increasing the retention rate of freshmen from 83% to 90%.  That will take care of about half of that.  That’s about 420 students, if our retention goes from 83% to 90%.

 

The second thing we are talking about doing is we are talking about pro-actively going after people who are qualified for admission this fall but are on a wait list.  And we have 2000 students now that meet our qualifications but can’t get in because we’re full.  So we are going to pro-actively go after these students by coming up with a plan that says that you do this during the first year, next year we will admit you next fall to Auburn.  They are already qualified to be admitted under our current admission criteria—it’s just that we can’t get them in right now.  So we are going to look at those two ways to see if we can get the sophomore enrollments back up.  If we do this, it adds about 1000 students.  Now, depending on where you put the students, this could generate somewhere between 5 and 12 million dollars worth of tuition revenue for the university.  I think that’s probably the best we are going to do because what we are talking about here is if we put the students in exactly the right place where they would go—and, obviously, there are some programs here—actually 25% of the programs when asked this question asked for a reduction in total enrollment because they felt like they were over subscribed.  So it’s a question not only of finding the students but finding the students in the right areas and that makes it even a little bit more difficult.  But I wanted to bring you up to date on it and know that we are looking at this as a way of trying to add some students to the program without negatively affecting what we are doing.  Thanks, Willie.

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  The chair will now entertain a motion to approve these recommendations.  We can do it collectively—approving the Vision Statement and the Mission Statement together or we can divide those out and handle each one of them separately.  Can I get someone to make a  motion to that effect?

 

Hold on.  While my very able team player checks on the status of a quorum—we do have a  quorum.  Can I entertain a motion to approve the two recommendations?  Are you recommending that we do them collectively?  Okay, we have a motion.  Can I get a second.  We have a second here.  Is there any discussion?  Bob McGinnis and then Jim Guagwa seconded it.

 

Cindy Brunner, Pathobiology:  Willie, I can’t find it on your orange sheet in a haste here but this is an informational item so do we have to do anything procedural to actually vote on this issue today?  I know we were all made aware of it through the dissemination of the agenda.  So technically had it been an action item we could vote on it.  Do we need to suspend the rules or anything?

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  Do you need this done before the next board meeting?

 

?:  We’ve been talking about it for half an hour—we might as well follow up on it.   (Laughter)

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  It wasn’t quite that long.  I think what we probably could do is move it down to perhaps new business and then we can entertain it at that particular time?

 

Patricia Duffy, Secretary-Elect:  Moves to suspend the rules.

 

-                     (WL)Yes.  Does it require a second on that sheet?

-                     (CB) Yes it does and I second her motion.

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  All right, we have a motion and a second to suspend the rules and address this particular item at this particular meeting. 

-                     All those in favor of suspending the rules let it be known by saying “Aye”.

-                     Opposes, “Nay”. 

-                     The motion carries so the motion is in order. 

-                     I’m assuming you will still make the same motion.

 

It has been properly moved and seconded that we approve this recommendation for the revision of both the Vision and Mission Statements.  Any discussion?

-                     All those in favor—senators only—please indicate by saying “Aye”.

-                     Opposes, “Nay”.

-                     The motion is carried.

 

At this time I’m going to ask John Mouton, our immediate Past Chair and also the Faculty Advisor to the Board of Trustees, to come.  John is going to do three things:  One is, he is going to talk about the last Board Meeting.  He is going to talk a little bit about his position, roles and responsibilities and also the representatives to the various sub-committees of the Board of Trustees.  He will start to address a little bit of that.

 

John Mouton, Faculty Advisor to the Board of Trustees:  I think that one of the things that we’ve had some discussions about is that we struggled for ten years to get a faculty seat at the Board and then got it and never really came to a conclusion about how we were going to use it to our advantage.  The points that I’m going to make today are introductory points—they are not conclusions but they are introductory points in regard to the role of faculty advisor.  The other thing I wanted to talk about is the March 19th meeting that we had with the Board of Trustees and some follow-up on that.  I think that one thing we may have lost sight of is how unique this opportunity is.  Less than 20% of the universities that were surveyed at the time we were pursuing this had a faculty member on the Board and so I think it’s really incumbent upon us to take advantage of this opportunity and not waste it.  I was looking at, Willie, what the objectives are and I think that there’s two objectives.  One objective is that the faculty suggestions and recommendations and perspectives on matters need to be communicated, not only to the Board but to individual trustees.  And I think that we’ve got to figure out a way to utilize this effectively.  I think communication is being listened to but it’s also listening and having interaction with the Board and it’s individual trustees is necessary.  I think, moreover, what we want to do is we want to influence policy decisions and I think one unique aspect about having this faculty advisor seat is the opportunity to have input prior to decisions rather than waking up the day after a Board Meeting to find that some action has been taken that we didn’t have any input.  So we need to get timely access and have the relationships and respect but I think, most importantly, we need to be prepared.  We need to have salient points and viable suggestions and then listen to the responses that we have.  I think that one of the things that I’ve realized is that in actuality our faculty representatives on the Board Committees have a better opportunity to influence than does the advisor at the Board.  Last year when we looked through it, we’ve appointed these committee members to three-year terms.  And somebody asked me, I guess year-before-last, about how much affect I thought they were having and, of course, the Board was used to having committees without any faculty members on them but the interesting thing is that these five new Board members coming on are going to go on to committees that not only have Board members but have faculty members.  We had a meeting last year, I guess last fall, with all of the faculty representatives on those Board committees.  I’ve been working with Rick Tabor on some stuff that I will talk about in a few minutes but I think that that group of people actually affords even  a better opportunity than the faculty advisor’s opportunity and I think that one of the things that we’ve got to do is develop some team work and develop some interaction with each other between the faculty advisor to the Board and the faculty members on the Board committees.  I might mention something too that I think is something to be addressed but it’s something that I thought of while I was deciding what I was going to put into this presentation.  The senate is advisory to the President.  That’s what this body does.  The faculty advisor is advisory to the  Board of Trustees, which is a whole different opportunity that we haven’t had before and I’m not sure right now as I stand here how we take advantage of it but I think that over time we will figure that out.  I think that the real thing that we are looking to do with the Board of Trustees is that we are looking to try to influence the policies that are developed by the Board of Trustees.  If it’s their role to develop policies then it’s our role to influence the policies.  One of the things that happens that a lot of people aren’t aware of is that a couple of weeks before the Trustee’s meeting there is a President’s Cabinet Meeting where the agenda for the Trustee’s meeting is set and at that time the faculty advisor and the faculty members on each of these Board committees are there and have the opportunity to call and question various things that are up and on the agenda and we’ve got to be prepared and I think that maybe one of the roles of the faculty advisor is to see to it that all of us, the faculty that interact with the Board, are prepared for that meeting so that we can respond in advance and have some impact on what makes it to the agenda.  We need to focus on what our objectives are and our objectives, of course, are all the academic matters.  One of the things that happened at this last meeting is there were some name changes that were taking place and there was one item that was a name change that was in question that Dr. Hanley was able to remove from consideration.  And then the other thing is the faculty and university welfare and I think as we get to these budget discussions over the next many months the university welfare and the faculty welfare are in concert but at sometimes they may appear not and we are going to have to worry about that.  I think that we have to assist—the people who are interacting with the Board—have to assist this initiative that Dr. Richardson has undertaken and that is, how is the Board performing, how is the Board acting and I think what we need to do is that we need to monitor the Board actions and decisions in interactions and then respond accordingly.  I’m going to talk in a minute about the March 19th meeting.  It’s something that occurred there that I raised a question about and it was resolved.  I think the other thing that we need to look at is that the faculty advisor is the immediate past-chair.  The faculty advisor needs to walk onto the Board with the benefit of the previous two years and needs to get there with preparation to interact with the Board.  And I think that part of the role that we need to have of our chair-elect and our chair is to be in preparation for this position and I think we need to look at how to do that. 

 

The March 19th Board Meeting—Don Large isn’t here so I can say anything I want about what he said—I am going to talk about the budgetary matters.  I think there’s some very serious budgetary matters on the horizon over the next five years and I think that we need to organize ourselves about how our input is going to be there.  Dr. Richardson started a new portion of the Board Meeting which was actually recognition of faculty—there were four faculty recognized—also two students that I guess were USA Today scholars or McDonald scholars, or something and anyway I think that was a real positive thing and he said that we would do it each time there is an opportunity to do it.  Dr. Richardson spent some time reviewing and getting a re-commitment to the existing policies.  He’s talked a little bit about updating the conflict-of-interest policy.  One of the big discussions was about Board communication with AU personnel.  Let me mention something here that I think that we ought to be alerted to as faculty and it’s administrators.  We go through all this stuff about what we expect in regard to—here are the rules with the Board of Trustees communicating with us—but as a department head or a faculty member, if I’ve got a relationship with a Board member, I want it to be okay for me to go to that person and ask for some special favor or some special dispensation.  And I think that we have a lot more of that going on than people believe that we do so I think that one of the things that we’ve got to look at is that, if we are going to ask that the Board communication coming through the university come through the President it needs to be the same in reverse.  The faculty advisor selection process—there is a resolution in place.  There was actually a by-law that was listed in the Executive Committee of the Board Meeting and then it was not acted on and I checked into it and actually they are gonna bring it back in June.  I guess they’ve got some other by-law changes and they are going to make them all at one time.  But anyway, that was something that raised some attention.  This may not sound real important to some people but it sure got a couple of us up.  They’re going to put a 375-foot wireless tower—to give you some idea that’s about three times as tall as the tallest building on campus—and they’re going to put a 375-foot wireless communication tower out here and we raised questions about asking about the light on the campus that it might propose and were assured it’ll be, I guess an asset to this.  But anyway at least the faculty member that’s on the Properties and Facilities Committee was raising the question.  I’m going to mention one thing that was unseen and I think that’s something that I’ve learned in the past couple of years as being in this position and I think Willie’s seen it too and we will see more of it—and that is the things that don’t get seen.  One of the things that did not make it to the agenda was the Legacy Scholarship which has been around for a while and it’s been an issue of debate and Dr. Richardson said that it was a decision to be made by the President and it was not brought forward to the Board.  I don’t know if I’m supposed to be reporting on those things but I mean I think that’s one of the things that transpires.

 

I do want to talk a little bit about our faculty input into the budget.  Don Large made a very informative presentation and I’ve asked him to make a presentation to a smaller group of us—that group not being defined, we are going to meet this week later with Rick Tabor and determine what we are going to do.  It may be a good idea for him to make that presentation to this body at some point in time.  Dr. Richardson has invited our input—our suggestions and our recommendations but I don’t think he is going to organize and call us up and ask us for it.  I think that we have to get pro-active in being able to develop that and I think that we need to get moving on it.  What I think that my idea is that I need to look at the people—we’ve got a faculty representative on the Board Budget Committee that I think is actually our point person in doing that.  And so with he and the faculty chair we need—look, we’ve got the faculty members on the  Budget Advisory Committee—I know that maybe we are looking for some replacement people there—but we’ve got those folks—we’ve got folks on the Planning and Priorities Committee and then we’ve got the Chairs of the University Senate and University committees—I think of the Faculty Salaries Committee, the Faculty Welfare Committee—but I think that we have Chairs of those committees that somehow we need to put together a group of people that can collect the information and filter it up.  And then we’ve got to figure out how to handle the individual faculty input and I’m going to let that be an issue for the Senate Chair—that’s obviously not my issue.  But this is one of the things that—if I’m going to stand at the Board or if Rick Tabor is going to be on the Budget Committee, we’ve got to be active on the input and we need to figure out a way to collect that.

 

One more slide and I’m done.  Don did a great presentation and it was all real positive about the things that we are but I think that there are some things that we need to recognize.  One is a great challenge that faces Auburn is that we don’t control, as a university, a lot of the cost that we have.  We have health care expenses that are escalating, basically at least our employee system is a self-insured program and it’s cost-sharing between the employee but we haven’t for the employees, most of whom are future retirees, plus we have the retirees.  The retirement contribution—that’s currently at 6%--we are talking about the retirement contribution being increased over the next several years—1% a year—up till ten years and these things multiply into millions and millions of dollars.  Our annual revenue—Dr. Richardson made enough of address that I’m not going to—but what’s going to happen?  Our revenue is primarily state driven and tuition.  In a real unscientific forecast, okay, looking at a variety of different things, which included pay raises for faculty, insurance costs and the rest of it, Don Large said that we could be looking at, budgetarily, up to a 25 million dollar shortfall—that’s against about a 500 million dollar budget in ’05 and an additional shortfall of 25 million a year.  Now we can manage our way out of that but there’s a lot of decisions that are going to be made in that process so the question is that how do we have input.  And I really think that when you look at it—when you look at budgetary input—our input is one of two things or both.  One, where is there revenue opportunity and I think the provost just talked about where there is a revenue opportunity.  Revenue opportunity is for me to fill my classes and not have half full classes, if we can find a way to do that.  But what are other revenue opportunities:  There are things that where are expenses—where can we get rid of or reduce some expenses that we have now.  So that’s an area that’s going to be a principle focus for a period of time.  That’s the end—if there are any questions?

 

Willie Larkin, Chair:  Are there any questions?  If you have questions or statements please go to the microphone.

 

What we plan to do is—the subsequent senate meeting to the Board of Trustee Meetings is to have John come on and talk about what took place at the Board Meetings and let us give him some information or talk about strategies or whatever.

 

I’ve got a couple of more things and then we will be ready to go.  We have two items listed under action items.  The first thing is that we’ve received the communication from the Auburn Alumni Association in regard to the Lifetime Achievement Award Selection Committee.  We have two faculty members on that committee right now and one of them have to come off—Wayne Flynt is going to be the person who departs from that committee.  Yesterday, the Rules Committee met and we recommended Donna Sollie as the person that would replace Dr. Flynt.  What I would love to do is just to get you, via consensus, approve the recommendation that is coming from the Rules Committee.  If you have opposition to that, go to the microphone and please state your opposition.  No one is moving so I’m assuming—although we have this under Action Item—that you feel comfortable with Dr. Sollie serving in this capacity.  Do we have any opposition to this recommendation?  I will take this back to the Rules Committee and indicate that you have approved by your silence.  Is that okay?  Let’s move to the final item before we get near the end.  Dr. Paul Starr had been selected and approved to serve as Chair of the Faculty Salaries Committee.  Because of some, I guess, time commitments and heavy demands on his schedule he has requested that he step down from that committee altogether and we have been feverishly contacting people—that is the Rules Committee representative—trying to get someone to serve in this capacity.  We did get a list of previous persons who’ve served on that committee and also those who’ve served as Chair.  If it’s your pleasure, I will take this back to the Rules Committee and ask them to further look for some people—and the reason we are trying to get this done as quick as possible, we thought we would have somebody today and that’s why we put it under “action”, is that the Budget Advisory Committee has begun to meet and this individual, this Chair, hopefully needs to be in those meetings so that they can represent the faculty along with myself.  So, if that is your pleasure that I take this back to the Rules Committee and you would give us permission to find a suitable candidate I’ll do that.  I’m seeing and hearing no responses so I’m assuming that this is okay.  I don’t want to do anything that you don’t want me to do but most of the Rules Committee people are in the room right now and these people were elected by you so I’m assuming that you trust their judgment.  These are not my wills—I’m just facilitating the meetings primarily.  So we’ll do those two things and then we will report back to you. 

 

Is there any unfinished business that should come before this assembly at this time?  Is there any new business? 

 

The next Senate Meeting will be May the 11th.  Don’t forget about the Board of Trustee Meeting and if there is no further comment, this meeting is adjourned

 

Adjournment:  Chair, Willie Larkin, adjourned the meeting at 4:30 p.m.