FACULTY COUNCIL MINUTES

250 Student Union January 13, 1998

David Buchanan called the meeting to order with the following members present: Ackerson, Bertholf, Bice, Bierman, Cole, Dawson, Edgley, Farr, Gedra, Horn, Hsu, Kimbrell, Krenzer, Lawry, Locy, Martin, Miller, Moder, Montgomery, Richards, Robinson, Sisson, Smith, Warde, and Wilkinson. Also present: Beer, Birdwell, Blakley, Clark, Collins, Harp, Keener, Knottnerus, Lingelbach, Mitchell, Oehrtman, and Watkins. Absent: Finn, Schwarz, and Scott.

HIGHLIGHTS

Dr. Buchanan announced that President Halligan was attending the NCAA meeting. Dr. Halligan has provided a schedule of future NCAA meetings. If there are conflicts with future meetings Faculty Council will try to adjust the schedule to accommodate his schedule since he would like to attend all Faculty Council meetings. Dr. Warde moved acceptance of the December 9, 1997, Minutes. Dr. Horn seconded the motion. The Minutes were approved. Dr. Warde moved acceptance of the, January 13, 1998, Agenda. Dr. Bice seconded. The Agenda was approved.

SPECIAL REPORT: UPDATE ON OMBUDS ACTIVITIES — Carolyn Hernandez

Dr. Hernandez assumed her responsibilities in September 1996. From that date until January 1997 there were three faculty that asked for her assistance on grievance issues and from January 1997 until present nine faculty were given assistance on grievable issues. The issues that have been raised were policy issues including promotion, tenure, appraisal and development and faculty disagreement. Mediation was suggested to about one half of these. Most of the people were mainly interested in information and did not want to take their problem to mediation or a grievance. One did use mediation and it was successful. Since her work and the grievance process are both confidential, it is not known if any of the others pursued a formal grievance. Dr. Hernandez feels that most of the people she has helped were satisfied with the information they received. Dr. Buchanan asked if people were aware of the existence of her office. She replied that many of the people have said they were not aware of her office until they were referred to her by someone on Faculty Council. There was an article in the paper but for the most part faculty are not aware that there is an ombuds at OSU. Dr. Buchanan asked if there had been any impediments to doing the job of being ombuds and affirmative action officer. Dr. Hernandez replied that there had not. It is something that could occur but to this point has not since most of the time the requests have been for information and help in communicating with the other person. Dr. Mitchell asked how many other people with non-grievance problems had used her office. Dr. Hernandez replied that 45 or 46 faculty and staff visited her office during 1997. Most of them had been staff and the issues ranged from miscommunication to pay issues to sexual harassment. The frequency of these visits has been increasing.

SPECIAL REPORT: HEALTH CARE UPDATE — Leo Blakley

Dr. Blakley said there was a story on Morning Edition that reported that health care costs had decreased in 1996. The story was somewhat misleading since shortly after the Clinton health care bubble burst and it was clear that there was not going to be a national health care program things changed and prices have been rising. It is not just OSU’s plan that is having trouble since the State plan is experiencing the same problems. To make estimates of what OSU will need to fund the program for the 1998-1999 year, Drs. Blakley and Oehrtman found that from 1996 to 1997 prescription costs increased 14.97% and the number of prescriptions increased 8%. They also found that the cost of medical procedures increased 8% and the number of procedures increased 6%. Using these figures and using different estimation schemes, they estimate that the 1999 costs will be between $22.6 M and $23.1M. American Fidelity estimates the 1999 costs to be $22.8M. These numbers do not include approximately $2M need to fund the claim reserve fund and to pay AF to administer the plan. If premium growth is also assumed to be increasing at the same rate as in 1997 then the plan would generate $16.9M in 1999. If premiums were to increase 30% then the premiums would generate $21.5M. American Fidelity says the plan needs a 40% increase in premiums. The other way to balance the budget is to cut costs. That is, pass more of the cost to the faculty and staff. In the PCS program: the addition of a $100 individual/$200 family front-end deductible with 20% copay for 34-day supply would save $0.5M, paying only generic price would save $0.05M, mail ordering up to a 90-day supply would save $0.06M and the elimination of the PCS prescription drug program would save $1.7M (Dr. Blakley feels this estimate is too high). For the rest of the program: an increase of deductible from $250 to $400 (individual) would save $1.4M, a decrease in copay from 90/10 to 85/15 in-network and from 80/20 to 70/30 out-of-network would save $1.2M, a decrease in copay out-of-network to 70/30 would save $1M, elimination of the $300 supplemental accident benefit would save $0.3M and the elimination of the $55 Wellness incentive payments would save $0.17M. There are also some cost increases. Some people are getting close to the $250K maximum so the committee feels it should be increased to $300K and this would cost $.07M. Implementation of HIPAA legislation will cost $0.6M. The mental health parity will cost $0.28M and the Immunization State Legislation will cost $0.096M. Dr. Lawry said he was having trouble understanding how these problems arose. It was less than a year ago that Dr. Birdwell reported that all our benefit packages were being renegotiated which would decrease costs. It appears that health professionals in Stillwater are getting less from us this year than last year. The assumption was that cost trends had been examined at that time. It turns out that this prediction was not close. Is there an explanation for this? Dr. Blakley replied that the biggest problem in our system and the State system was that they both had a backlog of unpaid claims. At this critical time when the costs were starting to escalate, and future costs were being predicted, the data was showing that costs were decreasing. It is also very hard to get accurate data on the premium income. Dr. Lawry suggested that if the data is flawed how can we be assured that the solutions given will solve the problem. Dr. Blakley said the techniques they are currently using should give better predictions. Dr. Lawry said that if we could not figure it out last year when we had an opportunity to look at the complete package, how can we hope to get it right this time. Maybe a consultant should be hired to study the problem. Dr. Blakley said we do have the option of joining the State system but they are going through similar problems. Dr. Martin asked how administrative costs of our program compares with those of other programs. Dr. Oehrtman replied that the administrative costs were not included in this data. Ms. Prater added that the employees of Stillwater Medical Center are paying $500 per month for medical insurance. Dr. Blakley said that the State program is charging $171 for the employee, $205 for the spouse and $240 for the children. At a 40% increase our rate would go to $211. Dr. Birdwell pointed out that from 1991 until now our program has had one rate increase and at one time we had a surplus. At the beginning of this year we had some recognition that costs were beginning to increase. When we were 3 to 4 months into the year we knew we were not going to be able to pay all the claims. What we can not control is what we are charged and how many people use the program. Last year the projection from the actuary was that PCS might cost us $100K more and it looked like a great benefit to provide. It is not that the contract with the administrator has increased but that utilization and cost have increased dramatically. This will have an impact on next years budget. Given the national trends, raising premiums and reducing costs still may not get us to a balanced program. In about one years time we have gone from a $3M surplus to a deficit just because of increased utilization. Dr. Edgley asked why. Are more people getting sick? Dr. Blakley said one of the reasons has to do with advertising. People are now asking for particular brands of medicines that have been tinkered with so that there is not a generic substitute. The quantity of claims may be caused by our group becoming older. We are all using more drugs. Dr. Horn asked if we were collecting data in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the Wellness Program in reducing health care costs. Dr. Blakley said that Jim Rogers has a research project to measure this and should have some results in about a year. Dr. Edgley pointed out that there is a conflict of interest in having the Wellness Center do such a study. He also asked who will be deciding what course we will follow to solve this problem. Dr. Birdwell said that the administration will make the final decision after getting recommendations from the Health Care Committee and input from Faculty Council and the Budget Committee. Dr. Blakley also pointed out that 1996 data shows that OSU is spending 5.3% of its salary-benefit package on health care compared with a national average of 7.8%.

REPORT OF STATUS OF FACULTY COUNCIL RECOMMENDATIONS: Executive Vice President and Vice Presidents

94-12-01-SALR Composition of Future Information Technology Committee: Under review. Some input regarding committee charge and membership has been received from the Deans, and Drs. Moretti and Buchanan. Final draft is being prepared for final reviews.

96-12-04-FAC Changes in Appendix D: Under review. Awaiting input from Deans. Dr. Keener will work with Legal Counsel to draft wording changes to more clearly delineate the role of Ombuds and provide additional specifics regarding membership to the Informal Review Committee. Requires Board approval.

97-02-02-ADHOC Patent Policy 1-0202: Under review. Will be resubmitted to Faculty Council to consider the changes made by Research Council, Dean’s Council and Legal Counsel.

97-04-03-ASP Guidelines for Scheduling Common Evening and Final Exams: Administration agrees in principle, but defers decision awaiting new computer system. Dr. Vitek has coordinated this review with the Registrar and the Faculty Council committee. Draft revisions are being considered. Because of the extensive computer reprogramming involved, CIS must postpone until new computer system is operating.

97-09-01-FAC Policy and Procedure Letter on Reappointment, Promotion and Tenure: Under review. September 9, FC approved the draft P&P as revised by the Faculty Committee. The draft has been forwarded for review, to include Deans Council.

97-09-02-FAC Return of Policy and Procedure Letter on Reappointment, Promotion and Tenure to Faculty Council Before Action by the President: Pending review of draft P&P Letter.

98-01-01-ASP Change in University Academic Regulation 1.6 entitled "Scholastic Requirements for Continuing Enrollment of a Student Under Academic Probation in an Undergraduate College": To President Halligan

Dr. Keener thanked Faculty Council and all the faculty for getting grades in on time. There were only six grades missing at 5:00 p.m. on Tuesday, December 23. All of these were in independent study courses and there were reasons that these had not been submitted.

Dr. Keener announced the president will take a plan for making up classes missed on MLK day to the regents for their approval. The recommended plan is for all Monday only classes to be rescheduled for the Saturday following the Monday of MLK day when no classes will be held. All other classes can be scheduled on that Saturday or rescheduled as each faculty member sees fit. This plan will be implemented during the spring semester 1999. Dr. Lawry asked about the status of the P&P letter on Faculty P&T process. Dr. Keener said it was to go to the Dean’s Council last month but it did not. It will be taken to the Dean’s Council soon.

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