DRAFT 01 29 2009
Report of Governance Council regarding
Charter Amendment on Consultation
On ……. the Governance Council approved the attached proposed Charter Amendment intended to ensure
better consultation between the administration and the elected faculty governance bodies. The last few years
have seen successive turnovers in the senior management of the university. This situation has led, on occasion,
to unsatisfactory implementation of the principles of consultation with the Faculty through its elected
governance bodies as embodied in the Faculty Bylaws and the Senate Charter. Some examples:
In 2005, just a few months after his arrival, the President formed the Selective Investment Committee
without involvement of the University at Albany elected governance bodies. While it certainly is the
prerogative of the president to form advisory bodies as she or he chooses, such advisory groups cannot
qualify as “consultation” with the University at Albany elected governance bodies under the Bylaws,
unless certain principles have been followed in the formation of such groups. Furthermore,
recommendations still needed to be reviewed and approved by UPC, thereby leading to redundancy and
duplication of effort.
The 2005 Periodic Review Report to MSCHE was drafted and sent to MSCHE without any University at
Albany elected governance bodies’ involvement whatsoever. In fact, the document was unavailable
until this past spring, when repeated requests by Senate Officers finally forced its release.
Since the URPAC committee (a budget advisory group created by former President Hitchcock) was
effectively dissolved in 2005, there has been no University at Albany elected governance bodies input in
any budgetary deliberations, contrary to what is stated in Bylaws 2.2.3. That same article also calls for
the administration to provide “detailed annual reports …….on actual budget expenditures.” No such
reports have been provided. The Governance Council welcomes the Interim President’s recent
formation a Budget Advisory Group. This is a step in the right direction.
Senate Charter X.2.8. calls for formal representation of UPC on budget advisory bodies established by
the President and Provost. The nonexistence of such budget advisory groups since Spring 2005 is
contrary to the intent of this article. This situation has been corrected with the recently created Budget
Advisory Group.
Over the past few years, a number of senior “Interim” administrators have been appointed to positions
without the “Interim” qualification (e.g., Dean of Graduate Studies, Vice President for Research, Dean
of the Business School, Dean of CAS, Vice President for Student Success, Provost). For several of
these positions, it has been traditional and an accepted “best practice” to form an appropriately
representative search committee that makes recommendations to the president. If such search
committees were formed in these situations, the University at Albany elected governance bodies were
not involved at all.
The selection and appointment of the current chair of the MSCHE Self-Study Steering Committee was
done by the then Office in Charge without any consultation with University at Albany elected
governance bodies. The appointment was later confirmed by the Interim President. A co-chair was
added only after Senate Officers had raised the issue, referring to the MSCHE guidelines.
