Meeting Minutes
Budget and Finance University Policy Committee
Meeting Minutes: February 16, 2004
Members
Present:
William Laird
Tassos Malliaris
Brian Welsch
David Schweickart
John Frendreis
Larry Fortune
Marge Beane
Tim McGuriman
Wayne Magdziarz
Tom Kelly
Member Absent:
Cindy Gonya
Tom Kelly reported that letters to staff explaining the change from LUERP to
a Defined Contribution Retirement Plan were mailed on February 12, 2004.
TUITION BENEFIT
Retiree Benefits
It was agreed that retirees would be eligible for tuition benefits. John
Frendreis recommended offering tuition benefits for dependents of retirees
with minimum years of service, e.g. 30 years.
Financial Aid Impact
Language addressing the integration of financial aid with the tuition
benefit, namely that eligible employees or qualified spouses and dependent
children of eligible employees, will be eligible for the greater of the
tuition benefit coverage or institutional scholarship award, but not both,
was added.
The policy also needs to clarify that the tuition benefit will be calculated
after all financial aid is awarded.
Private scholarships, which usually replace loans and/or work study, but
don't affect LUC aid, will also be applied towards financial aid
calculations.
The question was raised whether to implement the benefit with tuition
reduced by a percentage incrementally over the course of a couple of years
or to begin immediately at 75%. Tom Kelly will work with projections to
determine the impact either option will have on the budget.
It was agreed that any changes for the Fall 04 semester need to be
communicated during Spring, 04.
Pete suggested that conceptual changes, i.e. the implementation of a waiting
period for hires after 7/1/04, the expanded number of programs included
under the benefit, the introduction of a co-pay and waiver of current fee
structure, and the addition of a requirement for a retention commitment for
certain graduate level programs, should be communicated to the university
community as soon as possible, perhaps in the course of Fr. Garanzini's
state of the university address. Marge Beane suggested that a letter be
sent notifying retirees and tuition benefit recipients that changes are
pending.
Fringe Benefit Rate
Bill advised that a fringe benefit rate proposal, used to recapture overhead
costs associated with grant funded research work, is due to be submitted to
the federal government by 3/31/04 and as such, an additional meeting of this
committee should be scheduled to finalize factors such as active and retiree
health costs and the tuition benefit. It was agreed that a meeting would be
scheduled during the week of 3/1/04, after hours if need be.