The need for STIPulation to be brought up at Regents

Why the horse? Its name is Stipulate.

At next week's Regents meeting, there will be a recommendation to approve a transfer of $700 million from the UC's STIP (Short Term Investment Pool) to the pension fund.  As blog readers will know, the UC pension plan is underfunded.  In the opinion of the administration - endorsed by the Academic Senate - UC has more liquidity than it needs in the STIP which is used to meet day-to-day expenses.  The returns to the pension fund, which has a long-term horizon, are likely to exceed those of the short-term investments held by the STIP.  The transfer is part of an effort to return the pension plan to close-to-full funding by 2042.

Pay attention to the match!

Although not addressed by this transfer, you may well hear in the Regents' discussion next week about the unwillingness of the state to concede an obligation to contribute to the UC pension fund.  This refusal is in contrast to the situation at CSU which is under CalPERS and therefore gets a state contribution without a debate.  Note that if contributions are not made for the state's share of the annual pension obligation, other non-state contributors to the pension fund also don't pay in.  There can be only one contribution rate for everyone.

This issue is the 3-for-1 match problem.  Roughly two out of three contribution dollars that do go into plan come from non-state sources such as research grants and patient revenues.  Put another way, every dollar that should go into the pension - but doesn't - costs the Regents $3 in added liability.  However, the regents can't go back after the fact at some future date and extract contributions from non-state revenue sources for past liabilities that were incurred.  The match problem is not much of an issue for CSU since it does not have major research grants and hospital revenues.  Yet the state favors CSU in its pension funding policy.  Go figure.

Lot of food coming to Westwood

From the Daily Bruin:

An empty lot across the street from UCLA on Gayley Avenue officially opened to the public Monday as Westwood’s only food truck parking lot. The lot was met with an outpouring of support from hungry customers and backlash from Westwood business leaders who question its legality. The Westwood Village Food Truck Lot, on the corner of Gayley Avenue and Le Conte Avenue, will be open seven days a week for lunch and dinner, said Barry Fogel, promoter for Book That Truck, the company which manages the lot... 

Full story at http://dailybruin.com/2014/07/08/first-food-truck-lot-opens-in-westwood-amid-support-backlash/

Note to the wise: Don't overdo it.

Student Editorials Will Help Regents Get Out of the Corner They Painted Themselves Into

We have noted that the Regents painted themselves into a corner regarding their strategy of having a "balanced" selection of a student regent.  See our  prior posts if you have not kept up with this issue. However, recent student editorials will help the Regents out of the corner when they meet next week:

From the Daily Cal:

Despite the controversy surrounding the appointment of student regent-designate nominee Avi Oved, we believe that the UC Board of Regents should still confirm him in July. But the occasion of his confirmation has shed a light on the failings of the UC student government elections process.

Full editorial at http://www.dailycal.org/2014/07/07/oved-still-confirmed/

From the Daily Bruin:

...As much as some students may be insisting otherwise, this conversation is not primarily about campaign finance. It’s about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and it’s about divestment. It’s about Oved and where he has always stood in this debate. I’m tired of that conversation. It goes nowhere and gets nothing done...

Full op ed at http://dailybruin.com/2014/07/07/natalie-delgadillo-political-stances-overshadow-student-government-ethics/

Gender-Neutral Restrooms at UCLA

From the Daily Bruin:

The initiative, which some students in the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community started pushing for more than three years ago, is meant to make some students feel more comfortable using campus restrooms. The Undergraduate Students Association Council Student Wellness Commission donated $6,000 in early June to the UCLA LGBT Campus Resource Center to create signs for the restrooms, said Savannah Badalich, USAC Student Wellness commissioner. Each sign will cost between $250 and $300, and the design for the signs is not yet confirmed, said Raja Bhattar, the LGBT Campus Resource Center director. UCLA currently has more than 25 gender-inclusive bathrooms in multiple buildings in both North and South Campus...

Full article at http://dailybruin.com/2014/07/07/ucla-to-put-up-gender-inclusive-signs-for-certain-campus-restrooms/ 

Can we say the effort to have gender-neutral restrooms has been flushed with success?

NLRB Student Football Case Still Alive and Kicking

As blog readers will know, there was a recent NLRB decision saying college football players are essentially employees and therefore eligible for protection of their right to unionize.

The case is now under appeal within the NLRB:

Northwestern University urged the National Labor Relations Board Thursday to reverse a regional director's decision that classified the university's football players as university employees, therefore allowing them to unionize.
The university's argument was backed by several associations, six Republican members of Congress, and the National Collegiate Athletic Association -- all of which filed amicus briefs Thursday ahead of the case's midnight deadline...

The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations argued a similar point in its brief urging the labor board to affirm (the initial) decision...

Full story from Inside Higher Ed (with links) at: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/07/07/ncaa-republican-lawmakers-back-northwesterns-appeal-football-player-union

 

We have noted in prior posts that a former UCLA player has been active in the student-athlete unionization movement.

 

Will the NLRB hold the line and endorse its initial decision?  We will keep you informed.  In the meantime, you might enjoy:

 

Regents Meeting Next Week

The Regents' July agenda is now available on the web.  More detail may be posted later.  But the agenda is below.  It includes appointment of a student regent (about which we have previously posted).  The Committee on Finance is meeting but nothing is on the schedule about fossil fuel divestment.  Nonetheless, there is a public comments period on both days of the meeting and divestment (and the student regent choice) could easily be referenced there.

A new chief of staff of the Regents is to be appointed.  Perhaps the new appointee will be willing to consider indefinite archiving of Regents meeting (as opposed to the current 1-year limit policy).  Until that happens, if it does, we will continue indefinite retention of the audio on this blog.

Below is the agenda:

Wednesday, July 16

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

9:30 am Board  (open session)

9:40 am Committee on Long Range Planning (open session)

10:30 am Committee on Finance  (open session)

11:30 am Committee on Compensation (closed session)

11:50 am Committee on Compensation (Regents only session)

12:15 pm Lunch

1:15 pm Committee on Governance  (Regents only session)

1:20 pm Committee on Finance (Regents only session)

2:00 pm Board (Regents only session)

2:15 pm Committee on Compliance and Audit (open session)

2:45 pm Committee on Grounds and Buildings (open session) 

Thursday, July 17

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

8:50 am Committee on Compensation  (open session)

9:15 am Committee on Educational Policy (open session)

10:15 am Committee on Health Services (open session)

10:45 am Committee on Oversight of the DOE Laboratories (open session)

11:15 am Committee on Governance (open session)

11:30 am Board (open session) 

Source: http://regents.universityofcalifornia.edu/meetings/agendas/july14.html

A Modest Suggestion

We have had a few prior postings about the high cost of some guest speakers at UCLA and the fact that we apparently paid more to Hillary Clinton, $300,000, than other academic institutions have paid.

The Daily Bruin has an article about this matter and notes the fact that some notable speakers have spoken for free.  On the Hillary Clinton lecture, it is reported that the hope was to make a profit (tickets were sold) of $25,000 to $50,000.  (It is unclear what the actual profit was.)  So we got a donor to contribute $300,000 to get a net of $50,000.

Suppose we had just asked for $50,000 from the donor.  Or suppose we had gotten a guest free speaker or someone who would have spoken for substantially less.  Seems like the university and the donor could both have come out ahead in the gap between $50,000 and $300,000.  A modest suggestion!

Of course, yours truly knows where this modest suggestion will be filed by the powers-that-be.  See the image on this blog posting if you don't.  It's part of the general problem of assuming that if something is paid for out of non-state funds, the result is costless, which is the official response whenever such matters come up

Note: The Daily Bruin article is at http://dailybruin.com/2014/07/07/money-talks-ucla-pays-thousands-of-dollars-in-fees-for-notable-speakers/.