Union notes from Union / Management Meeting

/

Present – Michael Abraham, Prince Charles Alexander, Dennis Cecere, Peggy Codding, Peter Cokkinias, Beth Denisch, Marti Epstein, Rich Grudzinski, Danny Harrington, Teodros Kiros, Jeff Perry, Wendy Rolfe, Jackson Schultz, and Will Silvio.  

Management – Larry Simpson, Bill Whitney, Kari Juusela, Matt Marvuglio, Darla Hanley, Jeanine Cowan, Amelia Koch, Chris Connors, John Eldert, Camille Colatosti, Phil Lima.

  1. Jackson opened the meeting. We asked Mark Campbell to come to the meeting today and discuss Admissions policies and the instrumental needs of the college but he was unable to attend. We would like to discuss scholarships as well. Perhaps Damien Bracken could attend to discuss the comprehensive enrollment strategy. We will try to set up a meeting over the summer.
     
  2. The Union would also like to discuss the 3-year contracts in the very near future.
     
  3. 160 Mass Ave Building Construction Project Overview – Bill Whitney gave us an update on the project and showed the live footage of the building. 
     
  4. Emergency Planning – John Eldert. Sick building syndrome – our water has been tested in the 150 building, we have high algae content but no issues with the water. Overall, the 150 building is healthy and safe; we are now going to test the rest of the college facilities. The college leadership met after the transformer fire and the blackout to learn about how we can improve. We were close to evacuating the dorms – what would we do if we had to? We are looking at all the options for keeping the students in the dorms and providing electric, food, charging stations for phones, etc., keep the communications network up and running. This event brought a lot of issues to the surface and we will be addressing all of them. 
     
  5. We discussed the BENS contact and multiple calls, e-mails, texts at 4:30 am. 
     
  6. Retirement – Phil Lima. May 17 version 2.0 of retirement planning education sessions will be rolled out. We have been communication to all faculty and staff members 55 and over. Please share the word, post on the website. We will roll out pilot programs for the under 55 once we get feedback on this initial meeting. 
     
  7. We discussed the defined benefit program and the funding of that guaranteed program. We pre-fund this plan to ensure we keep this promise.