In attendance: Chris Mihiar, Thomas Morrill, Stephanie Parreira, Clint Mattox, Vance Almquist, Kris Osterloh, Zhian Kamvar; Ashley Bromley, Angela McClendon

Meeting called to order at 5:37 PM

Minutes from 1-26-2016 – Approved.

Email Decision – Approved random-number tie-breaker method for AFT-OR delegate vote count ties.

Online Tax Payment – Approved Angela paying the January federal payroll tax online.

GMM Debrief – Turnout was rather low: Thomas & Kris counted 55ish. Kris says there was a really interesting talk in Forestry that he knew a bunch of grads went to. A few other people left immediately after eating, which is always disappointing. The EC wonders what the GTFF does to have better turnout; Kris will talk with them. Ashley knows they have their GMMs a little earlier in the term; for us, that would mean doing the GMM before office visits or doing office visits earlier. Vance feels like office visits aren’t a big contribution to GMM turnout. Stephanie feels like some stewards need to work better on turning out their areas; Kris agrees. For next year, the EC would like Ashley to see if we can book Friday nights of week 4. We’ll revisit this next week as well, after Kris talks with GTFF.

Board of Trustees Meeting Debrief – Thomas attended last Friday’s meeting. He heard Ed Ray say “Sometimes people [students] who would be great on a committee don’t apply because they don’t think you actually want them.” He learned that the person who will be chosen for the open BoT seat will start in May. He also learned that Brenda McComb will step down from the faculty seat on the BoT in May because she’ll be appointed as Vice Provost; the faculty senate will choose her replacement. The ASOSU report included concerns about affordability of college; earthquake and/or shooter alarm systems; housing affordability; and lowering the required credit load for graduate employees. The board chair asked that committee reports be made as brief as possible so the board could get to lunch. There was a report on the evaluation of OSU/BoT by HECC; the report said they felt really uncomfortable being evaluated because HECC has no idea how universities work. The audit committee didn’t say anything about the audit other than “we learned a lot.” One student who spoke during the public comment period about OSU’s earthquake preparedness was pretty aggressively shut down due to being off topic – disappointing.

UHSC Meeting – Kris attended (most of) last week’s Health & Safety meeting, which was pretty good. There was a lot of “Are you doing this?” “Yep, we’re chugging along.” “Okay.” Not a lot of new work.

Trivia Night – This is next Thursday, February 11. Kris wants to host this time! We have some beer & cider left over from the GMM that we will serve. Zhian & Stephanie will meet at CGE at 6:15 to pick up the popcorn maker, etc, and start setting up. Chris will create an event on the fb group. Stephanie will send a social list email tomorrow; Kris will send one early next week and a day-of reminder.

Steward Council Meeting – Next meeting is Tuesday, February 16.

• Turnout: Vance suggests that he could set up individual catch-up meetings with stewards who don’t attend the meeting. Thomas suggests making the RSVP form options “Yes, I’ll attend the SC meeting on Feb 16” and “No, I’ll talk with Vance about when we can meet.” Vance will create the form and email it tonight.
• Agenda: AFT-OR Convention resolutions. Get feedback on GMM breakout session organizing ideas (Vance & Ashley will work on synopsizing them). Vance will ask Béatrice to prepare some written info for stewards to read in advance so they can discuss the use of CGE titles outside of official CGE business. Stephanie suggests putting the email-vs-phone question onto the sign-in sheets instead of being a discussion topic.
• Menu: We’ll do Yumm bowls (because we have a lot of Yumm sauce that needs to be eaten before March).

Bargaining – Our next sessions are this Friday, February 5, and next Monday, February 8, both in Westmin from 2 to 4 PM. The main topic on the agenda is health insurance! We’ll talk about topics like the potential for automatic enrollment and the standards for comparable coverage and waivers. Thomas will draft an all-member email. From a GMM suggestion, we’ll also create an event on the fb group to make sharing easy (Stephanie will do this).

Bargaining Turnout Incentives – Vance suggests asking folks to wear their CGE shirt when they attend, or if they don’t have one yet, to come in right before the session to pick one up. Thomas suggests making sure everyone has buttons (“I believe in a FAIRER contract!”) that they can wear to show their support, even if they’re unable to attend the sessions. Chris and Kris are excited about having a departmental competition.

Steelworkers Solidarity – A couple people from GTFF are trying to organize some Albany ATI picket line support for one of the next two Saturdays. Clint will contact someone with the Albany Steelworkers to see if they even want people there on a Saturday.

Meeting with AFT-OR Folks – Both Maria and Julia have emailed to ask to meet with officers, in particular Kris and Vance. They’ll shoot for next Wednesday. Kris and Vance will keep the EC informed.

AFT-OR Member Organizer Development Program – David Rives received approval from AFT National for his proposal to do a 3-way cost-share on temporary organizing staff made from local members. This is not something that seems like it would work for CGE. We will not pursue it.

Meeting adjourned at 7:02 PM