Watch the Regents Meetings of July 15, 2025

On the first day of the July Regents meetings (July 15), both the Investments Committee and the Health Services Committee met at UCLA. Prior to the Investments Committee, there was a public comments session. Topics including union layoffs, union negotiations for doctor-residents, antisemitism and indoctrination, antisemitism and BDS, student-parents, complaints about the Regents meeting requirement for transparent masks for those using masks (said to be a concern for disabled students), diversity initiatives, the need for a Medi-Cal coordinator, anti-Israel statements, and complaints about working conditions at a company owned by Apollo in which UC has some investment.

At the subsequent session of the Investments Committee, there was a request to approve revised asset allocation formulas for the various portfolios by CIO Bachhar. He noted at various points that he had already made the changes. One significant change was dropping all investments in hedge funds and instead funneling the money into public equities. Hedge funds, it was said, did not perform well historically. Student Regent Sonya Brooks asked for more data to back up the various requests. She got oral stories but not necessarily the data she was seeking.  It was noted that CalPERS just reported a good year (2024-25) for returns and that was similarly the case for UC. Regents Makarechian noted that liabilities for the pension are still growing faster than the assets. In 2008, the plan was 103% funded. Now, despite good returns since 2008, the funding ratio was 83%. He asked that increased contributions be put on the agenda for a future meeting.

At Health Services various executive pay matters were approved. There are concerns about the rising costs of pharmaceuticals and the possibility of creating a UC-run Pharmacy Benefits Manager (PBM) is being looked at, rather than rely on outside middlemen. It was reported that the state has created a new agency to try and hold down health spending. It was said that in the context of UCLA's new Medicare Advantage plan, UCLA was looking into creating some kind of PBM. (Reminder: UCLA's Medicare Advantage plan is NOT the plan offered to UCLA employees.) 

There was a review of medical schools' curriculums and their relationship to accreditation. Curriculum design at the med schools is largely out of the hands of the Academic Senate. Faculty control is within the various schools as an accreditation requirement. 

Finally, federal policy changes under the new bill signed on July 4th were discussed, particularly cuts in Medicaid (Medi-Cal in California). There is concern that complex work requirements will make actual work difficult to document, causing enrollment in Medi-Cal to drop. When that happens, the result will be patients showing up at the ERs with resultant higher costs.

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As always, we preserve Regents meetings since the Regents have no policy on duration of recording retention. You can find the recordings at the links below:

Investments: https://ia903207.us.archive.org/22/items/health-services-committee_202507/Investments%20Committee.mp4.

Health: https://ia803207.us.archive.org/22/items/health-services-committee_202507/Health%20Services%20Committee.mp4.

General website for July 15, 2025: https://archive.org/details/health-services-committee_202507.