12/11/2013: Geller: Faculty must be fully engaged An email from President Gottfredson’s General Counsel Randy Geller, sent round today: Work schedule for bargaining unit faculty members: This is a reminder that under Article 32, Section 21, of the United Academics Collective Bargaining Agreement, bargaining unit officers of instruction who do not…
Posts tagged as “Randy Geller General Counsel”
I’ve been trying to get a copy of the resume’s and job application letters for UO’s lawyers in the General Counsel’s office for the past 8 weeks or so. The qualifications of UO’s attorneys are a matter of obvious public interest given UO’s many current legal problems, the new legal…
6/13/2014: [UO Matters: Because of the importance of this meeting to the UO community, I hired freelance reporter Dash Paulson to report on it. His summary is below, followed by a detailed report on what happened at the meeting. His summary is below, followed by a detailed report on what happened at the meeting. As usual, things in quotes are quotes, otherwise it’s the gist of the conversation. I have edited Mr. Paulson’s report a little, but have not made any substantive changes. Paulson’s report on the June 12 session is here.]
Summary:
As at yesterday’s meeting, the Trustees were fully engaged and asked many questions, including some tough and skeptical ones.
Randy Geller began by briefing the board on their ability to call closed executive sessions, the potential pitfalls of FERPA, and their basic powers to discuss records.
President Gottfredson made extended remarks, first addressing sexual assault and saying campus safety for students and was the top priority. “There are students on our campus who feel unsafe. Like you I believe that’s unacceptable. As I believe, as you believe, any instance of sexual assault, sexual harassment, sexual assault isn’t acceptable. Not even one…There is nothing more important for ourselves to concern ourselves with.” He concluded those remarks by saying “We’re going to lean into this as much as we can. This is a big, important problem for us.”
He went on to speak about the dramatic changes that have occurred at the University and how important it is for the University of Oregon to change its governance model, “On my own checklist of things to do, having this board checks the first box. And the first box is we have to do things differently at the University of Oregon.”
Provost Scott Coltrane spoke about the new Clusters of Excellence hires and the process that went into selecting the top ten areas for cluster hiring. “We have buy-in from the faculty on this. But you’ll see the final list is very heavy on the sciences and applied sciences.” The list highlights the ten areas that will be a top priority for hiring. “I’ve gotten a little feedback on this … last week I got letters from faculty about how social sciences and humanities weren’t included here, and of course as former dean of College of Arts and Sciences they were unhappy with me.
Coltrane will be working with those faculty whose proposals weren’t picked and “who are a little cranky right now.” [Editor: The faculty objections are about the process as much as the specific proposals that were funded. See post with Department Heads letter here.] Some nearly made the top ten, such as environmental humanities and Geospatial revolutions. “We’ll be funding some of those also” but not at the same level. Cluster funding doesn’t replace other hiring, just different. We can refigure and reshape [this process] in future years with your help.”
Finally there was a long explanation to the board on the current status of the capital campaign from Mike Andreasen, Vice President of Advancement.
At the end, President Gottfredson paid tribute to Sam Dotters-Katz, who will be graduating, and to Randy Geller, who will be retiring this year.
The details:
Convene 8:33
Lillis: Randy is going to give us some reminders on our responsibilities as Trustees.
5/30/2014 update: Rumors prove false. The Trustees have now posted the June 12-13 meeting material, here. The delegation revisions start at page 55. At first glance this new draft seems to have addressed at least some of the Senate’s problems with Geller’s initial secret policy, but expect further review by the Senate’s ad hoc committee, chaired by President Rob Kyr (Music).
In other news, the board will host a public roundtable lunch discussion with former Interim UO President Bob Berdahl on Thursday, June 12. Berdahl’s brief presidency (and the hiring of Sharon Rudnick) was instrumental in persuading the UO faculty, including me, that a faculty union was needed to counterbalance the bat-shit craziness in Johnson Hall. As it has proved to be.
Among Berdahl’s last acts at UO were giving Jim Bean and Randy Geller three-year contract extensions, the dismantling of President Lariviere’s transparency initiative, and big raises for Rob Mullens and his coaches.
Highlights of his earlier career as UC-Berkeley President include committing the university to an unaffordable football stadium, quickly followed by a lucrative golden parachute buyout. Given the current situation with Mike Gottfredson and our Trustees, it is clear Berdahl’s expertise on buyouts will be invaluable.
5/30/2014 update: Gottfredson hiding new draft of “Delegation of Board Authority” policy from faculty?
This is stunningly hopeful news for UO. Geller claims it was his decision, but I think President Gottfredson deserves plenty of credit for this demonstration of leadership. I imagine the UO Trustees had a say too, after the Delegation of Authority disaster. From “Around the O”: Randy Geller, general counsel to the University of Oregon,…
UO GC and Board of Trustees Counsel Randy Geller tried to sneak a hack-job delegation of authority policy past the university and the board over spring break. He got caught, the board rejected it, and they called for the Senate to provide input on a new policy for adoption in June. The Senate…
4/8/2014 update: Not entirely, but this new UO legal services policy, to be debated and voted on at the Senate meeting this Wednesday, will sure put a crimp in his style. Among other sensible and long overdue restraints on our chief attorney:
Prior to any decision to participate in litigation not directly involving the University as a party by filing an amicus curiae brief, the General Counsel shall notify the President of the Senate of the intention to do so.
Kudos to Gordon Sayre (English) and Tom Lininger (Law) for getting this done. Maybe Geller will react by firing off another email like this one?
Or this unlawyerly stupidity, which made it into the Oregonian?
4/2/2014: Randy Geller’s anti-free speech brief fails, OSU pays out $101K
In brief: UO paid our General Counsel to help write an anti-free speech brief to the SCOTUS. From the timing, it looks like President Gottfredson authorized this.
Back in 2009 OSU staff trashed the news boxes of a student publication called “The Liberty”. Liberty sued OSU over a First Amendment violation. The 9th circuit court said OSU should pay damages. OSU tried to appeal the case to the SCOTUS, and a group of other universities wrote an amicus brief, taking a firm first amendment stand: against free speech, and for the OSU administration. Our own Randy Geller joined in:
Originally posted 2/13/2014: Hired by Randy Geller, paid by UO, but charged with helping the trustees fulfill their fiduciary obligations. Hmmm, what could possibly go wrong? Steve Duin of the Oregonian reports on a few possibilities. Job announcement here: The Secretary of the University is responsible for high-level facilitation and…
If you’re a coach like Chip Kelly who gets caught promising a “street agent” like Willie Lyles $50,000 to help recruit football players, UO General Counsel Randy Geller will spend $150K on outside lawyers, and then pay the NCAA fine for you. But if you’re a UO faculty member like…
Bennett Hall has an excellent story in the Corvallis Gazette Times: Oregon State University student media adviser Kate Willson thought she was just doing her job when she filed a public records request with the university. Now she’s worried it could get her fired. OSU’s chief spokesman says Willson’s job…
That would be in Kansas. From Scott Jaschik at InsideHigherEd. The newly adopted policy of the University of Kansas Board of Regents gives their President the right to fire faculty for tweets: The chief executive officer of a state university has the authority to suspend, dismiss or terminate from employment…
11/14/2013: An excellent piece of investigative journalism from UNC, here. Their university’s administrators were remarkably forthcoming about the costs of the outside investigations, and how much was paid by the athletics department and how much by the UNC Foundation. It took me years, and hundreds of dollars in public records…
Update: UO administration time-travels back to 2009, finalizes UO’s draft Academic Plan.For four years, the official copy of UO’s Academic Plan – ballyhooed today by President Gottfredson in the Senate – made clear it was just a draft: Now it’s suddenly been post-dated a day, and it’s final.Sporadic Senate live-blogging.…
11/11/2013: Also see related docs: 2012, Randy Geller accuses Senate President and IAC chair of publishing “offensive and false” comments. 2008 DOJ opinion on Faculty Assembly powers 2009 Melinda Grier opinion on Open Meetings Law and Senate 1992 IAC charge from Senate UO Matters IAC and NCAA FAQ From: Randy Geller <[email protected]>…
Synopsis: I apologize for the skimpy notes below. The Senate spent a fair amount of time on the Academic Freedom policy passed in April, but never signed by President Gottfredson. Neither Gottfredson nor Randy Geller was present to explain precisely what objections the administration had. Senate Pres Paris appointed a…