They're back - tomorrow

And a good time was had by all.

The UC Regents are meeting Wednesday and Thursday of this week. Yours truly has teaching and other obligations those days. He will continue the practice of archiving the audio of the sessions long term (since the Regents won’t do it for more than a year).  But the archiving will be done with a lag and as time permits.  Below is the upcoming agenda with some possible highlights:

Wednesday, January 21

8:30 am Committee of the Whole (open session - includes public comment session)

Surely, we will hear public comments on the tuition/funding issue.

9:30 am Committee on Educational Policy (open session)

Includes the proposal to tie athletic coach pay to student/athlete academic performance about which we have blogged earlier and the plan for dealing with sexual assaults.

11:30 am Committee on Oversight of the DOE Laboratories (open session)

11:45 am Committee on Oversight of the DOE Laboratories (Regents only session)

There will be discussion of the (really big) penalty levied against Los Alamos, albeit discussion behind closed doors.

Noon: Lunch

1:00 pm Committee on Long Range Planning (open session)

Includes the setting up of the committee proposed by the governor on UC costs.  There is also reference to the old UC Commission on the Future report (UCOF) which was put together in the face of the Great Recession budget crisis (to which the governor has referred in prior Regents meetings).

There will also be discussion of UC debt for capital projects, given the state’s shift of responsibility for such projects to the university. Will anyone (the governor with his cost concerns?) want to look at whether such projects are being properly vetted? Don’t bet on it.  

2:30 pm Committee on Compensation (closed session)

Involves union relations.

2:45 pm Committee on Compensation (Regents only session)

Big buck executive appointments and pay.

3:30 pm Committee on Finance (Regents only session) 

This session is closed but will take up what appears to be a settlement in the UC Davis strawberry case about which we have blogged.  See http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2014/11/the-empire-or-at-least-uc-davis-strikes.html.  Also, it appears that our ever-overly-ambitious LA District Attorney tried to appeal the court dismissal of a totally ridiculous case against a UCLA faculty member and that the appeal was rejected by the California Supreme Court. (People v. Lofchie) For background, see http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2013/04/lofchie-case-dismissed.html.  Finally, it appears that a suit challenging a UC patent by a “patent troll” was dismissed with prejudice.  We earlier reported on this case http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2013/07/the-story-of-uc-and-troll.html. 

4:20 pm Committee on Governance (Regents only session)

4:30 pm Board (Regents only session)

Thursday, January 22

8:30 am Committee of the Whole (open session - public comment session)

Probably more public comments on tuition/funding.

8:50 am Committee on Finance (open session)

Includes discussion of governor’s January budget proposal – about which the Regents (a majority of them) are not happy.

9:45 am Committee on Health Services (open session)

Ebola update.

10:15 am Committee on Compensation (open session)

Rubber stamp Wednesday’s big buck executive appointments and pay proposals. Possibly, there might be objections from elected officials and the governor’s new regents.

11:00 am Committee on Grounds and Buildings (open session)

More delegation to the campuses to approve capital projects which, of course, always are absolutely necessary and costless. Part I.

11:45 am Committee on Governance (open session) 

More delegation to the campuses to approve capital projects which, of course, always are absolutely necessary and costless. Part II.

Noon: Board (open session)

This is the session where the rubber stamp really gets busy regarding everything approved in committees.

Anyway, surely things will work out well: