AMERICAN ASSOCIATION of UNIVERSITY PROFESSORS the CONNECTICUT STATE UNIVERSITY CHAPTER
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AMERICAN ASSOCIATION of UNIVERSITY PROFESSORS The CONNECTICUT STATE UNIVERSITY CHAPTER 2014 Legislative Report Betty Gallo & Co. June, 2014 Betty Gallo Kate Robinson Joe Grabarz Brie Johnston 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS Preface Page 3 I. Higher Education Page 4 II. Labor Page 43 III. Budget Page 54 2 PREFACE The past several legislative sessions have been very active for CSU-AAUP. Funding, staffing, remediation, Board of Regents changes, labor agreements, restructuring, curriculum development and administrative changes have all been challenges to representing State University System faculty. CSU-AAUP and Betty Gallo & Company have worked closely together with AAUP staff and supportive legislators to ensure that faculty interests were represented. The past several sessions have seen a welcome increase in faculty involvement in legislative advocacy efforts, and an increased faculty awareness of legislative processes and deepened relationships with legislators. Organizing lobbying visits at the Capitol has been successful in working toward our goals. Public hearing testimony, timely action alerts and fact sheets have been valuable to our collective efforts. Together, we have significantly impacted legislation and improved the standing of CSU-AAUP faculty as a valuable resource in higher education discussions and decision making. The legislation discussed in this report represents a major effort by CSU-AAUP staff and faculty, Betty Gallo & Company staff and supportive legislators to shape events in favor of CSU-AAUP members and to make the State’s system of public higher education better. The shifting of Senate Chairs presented us with both a challenge and an opportunity this year as Senator Cassano became the new Co-Chair of the Higher Education Committee. We had early opportunities to present our points of view to the Senator, and he proved to be an advocate for many of the things that we care about. With three legislative leaders announcing their retirements and with two of them at one point running for Governor the political atmosphere at the Capitol was more charged than usual. An economy and a budget performing more poorly than predicted, and an administration struggling to improve its approval rating, added to the factors making this session unique. We at Betty Gallo & Company are proud and pleased to have been a part of this effort, and look forward to working together on future challenges and opportunities. 3 I. HIGHER EDUCATION SB 402: AN ACT CONCERNING FACULTY REPRESENTATION ON THE BOARD OF REGENTS FOR HIGHER EDUCATION. Passed. Public Act 14- 208. Awaiting the Governor’s Signature. This bill was introduced by the Higher Education and Employment Advancement Committee and was co-sponsored by Sen. Anthony J. Musto (D-Trumbull). The bill requires the Board of Regents for Higher Education's (BOR) faculty advisory committee (FAC) vice-chairperson to serve as an ex-officio, nonvoting BOR member for a two-year term but excludes the vice-chairperson from BOR executive sessions. By law, the FAC chairperson is already an ex-officio, nonvoting member and is similarly excluded from executive sessions. Currently, the BOR has 15 voting and five ex-officio, non-voting members. The FAC assists BOR in performing its statutory functions and consists of 10 members representing the institutions governed by BOR. This bill goes into effect on July 1, 2014. We spoke to the Co-Chairs at the beginning of the session and asked them to raise the bill and they agreed. Having Senator Cassano (D-Manchester) serve as Co- Chair made a big difference in our efforts. He wasn’t as invested in the original reorganization as Senator Bye (D-West Hartford) was and was able to view our position with less of a bias. Rep. Willis (D-Lakeville) had a much closer relationship with Senator Cassano than with previous Co-Chair, and that put us in a better position as well. We had spent time last year lobbying the Committee for the bill and so they were familiar with its provisions. We updated the fact sheets and the information packet and distributed it to members of the Committee and staff and met with several key members to ensure that there were no changes in support. Testimony in support of the bill were Stephen Adair, Ph.D., Chair of the Faculty Advisory Committee to the Board of Regents, and ex-officio member of the Board of Regents; Vijay Nair, MLS, President, Connecticut State University American Association of University Professors and Patricia O'Neill, Ph.D., Chapter President, WCSU-AAU, WCSU Representative Faculty Advisory Committee. There was no testimony submitted in opposition to the bill. As opposed to prior years when the BOR opposed the bill and any changes to the Board, they were low 4 key in their opposition this year. We kept in touch with other lobbyists for other constituent units and kept them informed of the bills progress. The Higher Education and Employment Advancement Committee unanimously passed the bill to the Senate. The Senate referred the bill to the Government Administration and Elections Committee where it had been in prior sessions. We met with the Co-Chairs and lobbied members of the Committee before the meeting. It was passed back to the Senate without debate. We lobbied the Senate to pass the bill and an action alert was sent out to urge the bill be brought up for a vote. Senator Cassano made the bill a priority. The Senate adopted Senate Amendment “A” on a voice vote. The amendment makes a technical change by increasing the number of members of the BOR in statute to reflect the addition of another faculty member. The Senate put the bill on the consent calendar and it was unanimously sent to the House. Because the bill was a Senate bill we were having a hard time getting the bill called in the House. Rep Willis and the Governor’s Office both went on our behalf to House leadership requesting that the bill be brought up. The end of session dispute between the House and the Senate made it difficult to get the bill called. No Senate bills of any kind had been called in the House up to this point. We met with House Majority Leader Arisimowicz (D-Berlin) and he was sympathetic and indicated that the bill would be made a priority and called when the embargo on Senate bills was lifted. We checked in with Republicans to ensure that there weren’t any problems with the bill. Another action alert was sent out. Finally the House began taking up Senate bills and it unanimously passed the bill in concurrence on the consent calendar on the last day. SB 30: AN ACT CONCERNING THE BOARD OF REGENTS FOR HIGHER EDUCATION INFRASTRUCTURE ACT. Died. (Parts of this bill passed in the bond package, SB 29.) This was the Governor’s Bill so it was introduced by Sen. Donald E. Williams (D- Brooklyn), Sen. Martin M. Looney (D-New Haven), Rep. J. Brendan Sharkey (D- Hamden) and Rep. Joe Aresimowicz (D-Berlin). 5 This bill would have authorized $103.5 million in new bonding under the Connecticut State University System (CSUS) 2020 infrastructure program (renamed by the bill as the Connecticut State Colleges and Universities (CSCU) 2020 program). It would have expanded the program to include the regional community-technical colleges and Charter Oak State College and extended the program by one year (to FY 19). The bill would have also allowed the Board of Regents for Higher Education (BOR), which administers the program, to revise CSCU 2020 project amounts without legislative approval if the revision is due to reallocating unspent funds from a completed project. It would have required BOR to report biannually to the legislature on how it allocated project funds among the state universities and community colleges. Under current law, a program project includes, among other things, improvements, reconstruction, replacements, additions, and equipment acquired in connection with any facilities existing on July 1, 2008. The bill would have eliminated the requirement for these facilities to have been in existence on July 1, 2008. It would have also eliminated a requirement that BOR receive approval from the administrative services commissioner before acquiring or purchasing equipment, furniture, or personal property using funds from bond proceeds. The bill would have renamed the board's biennial facilities plan as the facilities and academic plans and makes other technical and conforming changes. CSCU 2020 The bill would have authorized $103.5 million in new bonding under the CSCU 2020 program. It would have added new projects, replaced others, and added, decreased, or canceled existing authorizations, as shown in Table 1. The table also indicates to which phase of the program the changes would have applied: Phase I (FY 09-FY 11), Phase II (FY 12-FY 14), and Phase III (FY 15-FY 18; extended by the bill to FY 19). The bill would have made no net changes to phases I and II, but it would have increased Phase III authorizations by $103.5 million. Table 1: Project Authorizations Current Proposed Project Phase Change Authorization Authorization Central 6 Code I $18,146,445 $16,418,636 ($1,727,809) Compliance/Infrastructure II 6,704,000 6,894,000 190,000 Improvements III 5,000,000 0 (5,000,000) New Classroom Office I 33,978,000 29,478,000 (4,500,000) Building East Campus Infrastructure I 13,244,000 3,680,000 (9,564,000) Development (replaced by bill III with Renovate Barnard Hall) 0 18,320,000 18,320,000 Burritt Library Expansion I 0 9,900,000 9,900,000 (design/construction)(replaced III by bill with New Engineering Building(design/construction 96,262,000 52,800,000 (43,462,000)