HRAC Summary by Brent Fryrear
September 8, 2005
The August minutes were approved by consensus.
Julien welcomed HRAC members back as well as introducing the new members:
Martyna Warren was absent but introduced as Ginger Brown’s replacement. Pam Feldhoff replaced Nancy Utterback.
1. Curt Dame from Aon discussed the Life Insurance and Dental RFPs. The university provides us with twice our annual salary in insurance plus accidental death and disability insurance. The new vendor (which cannot be revealed as yet) will also include a voluntary insurance plan that employees can purchase up to 3 times their annual salary in term life insurance.
Voluntary Dental Insurance
This is now being provided by Delta Dental, but the recommended vendor will be Humana. They are a fully insured plan; they have a larger network of Dentists and a plan that has better discounts and costs less to the employees than Delta provides now. Our DentalSchool accepts Humana dental insurance, but not Delta Dental.
There will be no default enrollments during open enrollment this year.
2. Welcome to Cathy Carter, the new Employment Services Manager. She is no relation to Julien, that question was asked… She was with Seven Counties Services in HR and a number of other capacities over time. She has a Senior Professional in Human Resources designation from the Human Resource Certification Institute.
3. Domestic Partner Benefits – Faculty and Staff for Human Rights is meeting with President Ramsey on Monday to present its paper on Domestic Partner Benefits. They are supposed to get the paper to the HRAC members by tomorrow (Friday) and they would like the endorsement of the HRAC. I will send that on to you when I receive it. They would also like to have the support of the Staff Senate during the Monday meeting (if possible). One of the members will call me during lunch to see if the senate was supportive.
4. Flexible Spending – Use it or lose it…
There was a discussion about the 2.5 month extension that the Treasury Department has granted. Consensus of the committee was to explore more and recommend that U of L add the 2.5 months. HR will see how to do this administratively.
5. Appeal Policy – because of the revisions, an HRAC workgroup will review before next month’s HRAC Meeting and make suggestions for improvement. Angela , Dhiane B. and Linda Wilson will work with Julien.
6. Tuition Remission – tabled – committee wants to look at old policy and compare to proposed policy.
7. Reduction In Force Policy - because of the revisions, an HRAC workgroup will review before next month’s HRAC Meeting and make suggestions for improvement. Brent and Dean Mundt will work with Julien on this workgroup.
8. Performance Coaching - because of the revisions, an HRAC workgroup will review before next month’s HRAC Meeting and make suggestions for improvement. Brent, Linda Wilson and John Ralston will work with Julien.
9. Military Leave – It is federal law – can go forward to groups…
10. There are some proposed revisions to the Faculty Redbook…I can provide you with copies.
11. New procedure for submitting policies to the Staff and Faculty Senates. After PTO, Julien asks that communication about policies from HR should come from HR.
12. There were a number of questions about Katrina and Students from other schools.