In attendance: Stephanie Parreira, Thomas Morrill, Clint Mattox, Kris Osterloh, Zhian Kamvar; Ashley Bromley, Angela McClendon
Meeting called to order at 5:40 PM
Minutes from 11-3-2015 – Approved
Email Decisions – (1) Appointed Riki York to the Steward Council for Horticulture. (2) Approved 1 PM on December 17th for the Ed Ray meeting. (3) Approved automatic extension for IRS Form 990.
Steward Council Debrief – It went well, although turnout was a little low. The food was good! Several of the stewards who held department meetings mentioned that their turnout was low. Ashley says we should have a discussion/training on how to turn people out to events. The resolutions committee presented their guidelines.
Social Hour Debrief – There was only one person who showed up to join Kris. We pretty clearly need to advertise it more. We may need to reconsider the timing as well. Maybe just once a month? Kris suggests targeting social hours to people from the department or college that the host is in. (However, part of the point of social hours is to help people meet members from other departments.) Zhian suggests making sure there are two hosts every time. Our next social hour will be December 5th; Stephanie plans to host.
Trivia Night Debrief – We had great turnout and Zhian did a fine job of his first time hosting. We finished all the AGEL food leftovers, too. There weren’t enough chairs in the room (they’ve removed a bunch that used to be in the closet by the sink), and the Senior Center is now charging for any items that aren’t in the room as it’s set up when we arrive. We got 8 more plastic chairs at $1 each (it would’ve been $2 each for padded ones). That was disappointing, but not as much as not being able to use wifi anymore.
AFT-OR Presidents Conference Debrief – Kris and Thomas felt like it was fun and even useful. They started with a talk on the Friedrichs case that was really informative. Then there was a discussion on the strategic plan. This is the last year that the Presidents Conference will be held at the Benson (it’s become difficult to justify the expense). Chris Mihiar had to cancel at the last minute, and since AFT-OR had already paid for all the food and rooms, we really wanted to send someone in his place. Ashley personally asked just about everyone on the Steward Council and no one was able to go. We decided to send one of last year’s officers, Gloria, who is no longer in the BU but paid associate dues for the month and has still been a big help with CGE events this year. Gloria was a great substitute.
Audit Update – The audit CPA, Teresa, has sent drafts of the audit and fair share reports. Angela emailed them to the EC list. Angela and Ashley looked through them and they look fine. Teresa will send final reports soon, so we should be able to get the notices out next week! (The audit process has definitely been easier this year.) Teresa also sent the IRS Form 990 for review. Angela hasn’t had a chance to go through it yet but since we filed the automatic 3-month extension, it will be okay to get the 990 submitted later than the 15th. Angela will plan to review it next week.
Letter of Intent to Negotiate – The B-Team met today and they decided to have the letter delivery (aka Bargaining Kickoff/Launch/Blastoff!) next Thursday, November 19th, at 4 PM. We’ll meet at the MU quad and walk to Kerr. We have money in the budget for bargaining outreach, so CGE will buy some tots and other snacks at McMenamins afterward (we’ll be there in time for happy hour food (3–6pm). Turnout: Each officer will bring 10 friends! Yes? It’s a great idea to invite people from the Alliance for a Socially Just University; Thomas will reach out to them. Each officer will individually email several stewards (Ashley will split up the list) and ask them which members from their departments they will bring along. Stephanie will create an event through the CGE fb group; officers will all invite their friends in the group. Thomas will draft an all-member email to go out Monday. Officers will email their department lists too.
Bargaining Team Members – One of our B-Team members just got an offer for a job in Alaska starting in early 2016, so she won’t be able to participate in bargaining after this term. That means we’re down to 6 on the team, including Thomas and Ashley. We need a couple more! Ashley and Thomas have a few specific people they will ask.
Health Insurance Enrollment – Rachel from the insurance office at SHS just emailed to tell Ashley that there are still over 100 grad employees who haven’t enrolled for insurance. She asked Ashley to help by sending out reminder emails. The EC approves Ashley working on this because she’s very effective.
AFT-OR Convention Location – The 2016 convention will be at the Chinook Winds Casino in Lincoln City. The Seaside Convention Center (where OR AFL-CIO convention was just held) is a great location but already booked for the next four years. They decided not to consider the Vancouver (WA) Hilton location from last year; some people were displeased about not being in Oregon, and there’s additional travel & lodging expense. The Benson is too small and too pricy. Sunriver was ruled out because of its poor labor management practices. Kris is on the AFT-OR convention committee; the EC would like him to push for booking Seaside for five years from now, and a more ethical location for the years in between.
PSU Home Visits – We’ve been asked to contribute a couple people for home visits on Saturday, November 21st. EC folks are not available. Thomas suggests we ask people who went during AGEL.
Grad School Introduction Meeting – With Kris away for field work and other summer schedule conflicts, we never got around to having that meeting between the new EC and the new Grad School admins. Kris will email to invite them to a lunch meeting soon.
OR Labor Law Conference – This is happening on Friday, January 29th. Thomas, Béatrice, and Alisha went last year and all thought it was very good. Kris is interested in going but the timing is not very good. Last year, the LBL-CLC paid for Alisha’s registration; Clint may be able to ask them about sending him this year, but unfortunately he thinks the all-day Friday event will conflict with his classes. We’d like to ask members of the B-Team and members who expressed interest in the committee on potential loss of fair share. The registration cost is $95 per person and is due by the end of December.
Health Insurance Informational Event – Clint asked Rachel but she wasn’t available until November 24th and also not available December 3rd. This term isn’t looking good for the event. Clint will ask her about coming to the first part of the Steward Council meeting on January 12th.
Strategic Goals Preview – Organizing: We need to consider how to create a new, more effective Steward Council meeting structure. We also need to divide big departments and create organizing plans for areas with low membership percentage. Social: We had a great trivia night! Communications: We’ll punt the idea of putting a flyer in every grad employee’s department mailbox until next term because we can’t think of anything that needs to go out at this time. Thomas will help Stephanie update bulletin boards. Clint is working on the HI info event. If we anticipate great turnout to the Bargaining Blastoff!, we could invite the Advocate and/or Barometer to come cover it. Bargaining: We need to start thinking now about improving turnout to the sessions. We’ll try really hard to turn out more than 50 people for the letter of intent delivery, including some Alliance folks. External Relations: We sent one member (Clint) to a community solidarity event. Clint is unable to attend this month’s CLC meeting; Thomas is interested in attending if the timing works out; Clint will send him more info. Financial: The audit is about done! The 990 is in progress and also about done. AFT-OR: We went to the Presidents Conference and AFT-OR EC meeting. [One thing that happened at the EC meeting was they signed onto a letter against a sort of ridiculous “school fundraiser” that McDonalds does in some districts.] Brew-Off: The BOC is debriefing next week. Ashley has started on thank-you notes; we’ll send when the donation is finalized; currently it looks like it will be around $8,500. Upkeep: We got through October, so now it’s time to work on the goal from August of drafting the affirmative action plan; Thomas will set up a conversation with Stephanie and CCGEE.
Next Week’s EC Meeting – Four of the EC will be at a conference next Tuesday. We’ll see how we feel next week about whether we need a meeting. Currently we feel like we can manage business over email for the next couple weeks. If it turns out otherwise in the next few days, we’ll have a phone/skype meeting on Tuesday evening. [This reminds Ashley that she’d invited Taylor Sarman to the EC meeting that we’ve just cancelled. She’ll ask him to come to a different one. Taylor is the former ASOSU president and former* student delegate to the OSU Board of Trustees; he’s now working for a lobbying group called A Better Oregon and wants to give their presentation on the state of Oregon’s economy to the EC. *We learned just now, when Ashley looked it up, that Taylor has been replaced on the BoT without any input from or communication to CGE. It seems likely that they just asked ASOSU to select someone.]
Meeting adjourned at 7:21 PM