Chair Stone, Senators Feakes, Hazlewood, Hindson, Homeyer, McGee, Montondon, Sorenson, Warms, Weill, Wiley, Winek

Guests: Assoc Provost Bourgeois, Asst VP, VPFSS Planning Nusbaum, Scott Thomas, University Star

Meeting called to order at 4:00.

1.        No academic department should receive fewer M&O funds in FY 2008 [first year] than in FY 2007;

2.        All salaries and wages, including those paid with former course fees funds, have been excluded from departmental expenses histories

3.        As a result of #2, all the salaries and wages formerly paid from course fees funds are to be newly budgeted in the appropriate commitment items

4.        Fixed telecom costs have been extracted from M&O budgets and are to be funded separately

5.        Lab fees are included in this allocation

6.        No department shall lose or gain more than 5% in M&O funds each year after FY 2008

7.        The five-year weighted expenditures is designed to be updated annually, creating a rolling weighted five-year average of the five most recent fiscal years

8.        All other data, e.g., faculty headcount, fte, sch, etc., are to be updated annually

9.        A reserve fund will be created to address extraordinary funding needs not met by the allocation formula, e.g., dramatic increase in faculty headcount, fte, sch, etc.

10.     Expenditures captured include outlays for equipment replacements or purchases of new equipment/software, existing maintenance contracts, etc., but does not include expenditures funded by grants.

For the allocation model, weights were assigned to certain factors based on the size of correlations between these factors and actual maintenance & operations expenditures. Additional travel dollars were allocated to the department based on roughly $600 per FY 2007 tenured and tenure-track faculty member in each department. The allocation will include $414,000 new dollars.  It was also noted that the proposal got unanimous support from the Council of Chairs.  After some discussion of indicating general consensus for the proposal, the Senate also endorsed the proposal.

Planning and Construction Update: Asst VP, VPFSS Planning Nusbaum discussed current construction projects.  Beginning in April were:

• Speck Street Parking Garage for 721 parking spaces, a garden area, and a new street off Holland to provide two entrances to the garage. Anticipated completion is June 2008.
• Harris Plant Renovation with complete replacement of the chillers and cooling towers to provide air conditioning for west campus buildings. The Harris Dining Hall entrance has been relocated to the south of the building off the mall. Read Street will be closed to thru traffic during construction.
• Roy F. Mitte Technology and Physics for 5th floor build out for the School of EngineeringWork on Beretta Hall will begin and be completed by Fall 2007.June

Beginning in May:

• Student Recreation Center Addition with new courts, rocking climbing wall and natatorium. Read Street will be closed to thru traffic during construction. Anticipated completion Spring 2009.

Scheduled for July:

• Concho Green: "green space” project involves closing Concho Street from Moon Street to Edward Gary Street and from Edward Gary Street to LBJ Street. Work will also occur on LBJ Street and Guadalupe Street to provide angled parking and an improved front door entrance to the Undergraduate Admissions Center.
• The Bus Loop Project on N. LBJ Street to build a new bus loop for the campus. This will require the closure of the second and third floors of the Pleasant Street Parking Garage for six months. This project will reroute pedestrian and bicycle traffic coming from north of the campus around the Music Building. Faculty and staff who normally use this garage can park at the lots below the Physical Plant. A shuttle will be provided to transfer faculty and staff to the center of campus for the six-month period.

Projects such as the Undergraduate Classroom Building, the new School of Nursing are dependent on Legislative funding, but prospects for funding are favorable.

Survey Report:  The final version of the Annual Faculty Perception of Administrators Survey was discussed.  The report was approved and will be presented the President and Provost at next week’s PAAG meeting and posted to the faculty soon thereafter.

Development Leave Rankings:  The ranking from development leave applicants was approved 10-0-1 and will be forwarded to the Provost.

Honor Council Chair:  The Senate recommended Dr. Rebecca Bell-Metereau, English, as the new chair of the Honor Council.

Senate Elections:  Runoff balloting has begun in the Colleges of Business, Education, Fine Arts & Communication and Health Professions.  Results should be available next week.

PAAG Agenda:  Topics for next week’s PAAG meeting were discussed.  Items for the agenda are:

• Faculty Senate endorsement of the proposed M&O Allocation Model
• Presentation of the Annual Faculty Perception of Administrators Report
• Tracking of Promotion/Tenure Results
• Impact of Hiring at CUPA Median
• Funding for New Faculty Positions

Core Curriculum:  The Provost has sent letters to the academic departments to make adjustments in their programs to meet the 120-hour mandate or to file for exceptions.

Minutes:  Minutes for 04/11/07 were approved.