Inside Iowa State

Oct. 20, 2006

Smoking still an issue with P&S Council

by Erin Rosacker

Not only would the smoke-free zone extend 25 feet from campus building entrances beginning Jan. 1, but all tobacco use on campus would be prohibited one year later, under a revised motion proposed by the Professional and Scientific (P&S) Council's policies and procedures committee Oct. 5. The original motion, presented last month, didn't include the campus-wide ban.

Dan Woodin, chair of the committee, introduced the new motion, which added a reference to the recent property-wide smoking ban instituted at Ames' Mary Greeley Medical Center and McFarland Clinics. It also included a request for President Gregory Geoffroy to provide funding for smoking cessation programs to students, faculty and staff.

The topic dominated much of the council's meeting, with discussion of such issues as enforcement, language and input mechanisms for constituents. As new business, the draft motion is automatically tabled until the Nov. 3 council meeting.

The policies and procedures committee also presented a draft motion to change the council's bylaws to create a university planning and budget committee of the council. According to Woodin, the standing committee would focus on the strategic plan, the university budget and resource allocation processes.

"This is a way to set up a committee that is just focusing on those particular items all of the time -- asking for information and bringing that information to council," Woodin said.

Discussions on the representation and structure of the committee will continue, with no immediate vote planned. In the meantime, council president Cathy Good is setting up an ad hoc committee that will focus on the budget.

"Perhaps this could be a predecessor to the new standing committee that is proposed," Good said.

In other council business:

A draft motion was introduced to assign P&S representatives for "external affairs" as representatives for either the president's office or business and finance. "External affairs" referred to the vice president for external affairs office, which was eliminated in 2002.

Carla Espinoza, associate vice president for human resource services, reported that she and vice president for business and finance Warren Madden would be presenting a proposal on extra-meritorious pay to the president within the next few weeks. Espinoza said that discussions continue among her peers at the other regent institutions concerning the flex-pay issue, as well as the employee tuition program.

Brenda Behling, program coordinator in the provost office and liaison to the council, announced that the provost office would send a recommendation to Geoffroy that endorses implementation of the proposed budget model.

A revised motion that included a campus-wide smoking ban was introduced at the Oct. 5 P&S Council meeting.