Association of Professional Administrators

Minutes 2024-11

Date/Time: Thursday, November 14, 2024, 6:30pm
Friday, November 15, 2024, 10:00am – 12:00pm
Location: Hammond Campus Center, Fitchburg State University & ZOOM Room

Present

APA Statewide

  • Seth Bean, President
  • Susan McNeil, Vice President
  • Mark Powers, Secretary
  • Aaron Childs, Membership Coordinator (Non-voting)
  • Julie Dunlap LePoer, Web Manager (Non-voting)

APA Chapter Presidents

  • Seth Bean, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts
  • Kelly DeMello, Massachusetts Maritime Academy
  • Peter Fenuccio, Worcester State University
  • Susan McNeil, Massachusetts College of Art & Design
  • Jenna Shales, Bridgewater State University
  • Rebecca Shersnow, Fitchburg State President
  • Rosa Taormina, Salem State University

Guests

  • Auditors: Peter Brown, Barrett Bernier, & Kairy Bencosme of Citrin Cooperman & Company, LLP
  • Gretchen Mayhew, Fitchburg Chapter VP

Absent

APA Statewide

  • Sean Barrett, MTA Field Representative (Non-voting)

APA Chapter Presidents

  • Brian Cahillane, Westfield State University
  • Jane Decatur, Framingham State University

Call to Order

  • Nov 14, 2024 Time: No Meeting
  • Nov 15, 2024 Time: 10:00am

Approval of Minutes

  1. Approval of October 18, 2024 Executive Board Meeting Minutes
    • Amendments: None
    • Motion to approved the minutes of the October, 2024 Executive Board Meeting as presented/amended made:
    • by: R. Shersnow
    • 2nd by: R. Taormina
    • Vote: Unanimous
    • Action: Motion Carries

Public Comments

  1. None

President’s Report – Seth Bean

  1. None

Treasurer’s Report – Maria Brunelle

  1. Auditor’s Report (unable to get copy of their agenda for the minutes)
  2. Payroll due on Tuesday, November 19, 2024 by 12:00pm.
  3. Approval of September 2024 & October 2024 Treasurer’s Report
    • Amendments: None
    • Motion to approve Treasurer’s report as presented/amended made:
      • by: S. McNeil
      • 2nd by: R. Taormina
      • Vote: Unanimous
      • Action: Motion Carries

Membership and Data – Aaron Childs

  1. 1513 Overall Membership since October 2024. An Increase of 36.
  2. 286 Non-Dues Paying Member. An Increase of 23 since October 2024.
  3. Domain name has been renewed with GoDaddy for another 5 years.

Website – Julie Dunlap LePoer

  1. Regular updates made to website
  2. Rebuilt negotiations page

Health and Welfare Fund Report – Susan McNeil

  1. November 14, 2024 MTA Health and Welfare Update
  2. Gray Group
    • Tim Gray the money funds manager reported.
    • 2024 our fund is up 12%
    • US stocks have outperformed International for 14 years now it is due to make a flip probably in the next 3 years
    • 10% of our fund is Bonds and Cash
    • Small bump in domestic small stocks since Nov.6
  3. Members 9139
    • Cobra enrollment is down
    • MTA enrollment is up 139 members; We continue to climb steadily
    • Commonwealth is up to date on their payments to the fund
    • We have 8 months in reserves
  4. Met Life Dental Rep Tim Head
    • The loss ratio is good. He reports continued efforts to recruit new dentists has had some success in Amherst areas zip code 010
  5. Matt Cole who is the representative from the DHE/BHE to the HW board of trustees has reported that he is in the process of hiring his replacement to the Health and Welfare Board of Trustees Committee.
  6. The current Treasurer Katie Reil from the union side is going to be stepping down after 1 year we will look to replace her with another union representative.
  7. Back in April we received support from several management trustees and, MTA Health and Welfare Trustees on both union and management sides voted unanimously to begin the process of exploring a merger with the Massachusetts Public Employee Trust Fund (the MPE Fund). While this is only the first step in getting better dental, vision, and orthodontic benefits for our members in the MTA fund, we are very excited because we have been working for a few years to get to this point.
  8. The motion authorizes the exchange of documents and information between the MTA and MPE Funds so that the MPE Fund can determine whether they are willing to agree to a merger with the MTA Fund. In addition, the MTA Trustees approved hiring a consultant to complete a comprehensive comparison of the dental/vision benefits and providers in each of the Funds. That way, if a merger is feasible and the MTA Trust decides to take up a merger vote, they will have a full understanding of the pros and cons.
  9. Things are finally in motion and the RFPs have been sent to three consulting firms for their bids. The Trust will then choose which Firm will move forward with the comparisons.
  10. In the March 2025, we will be putting RFPs out to 5 major Insurance companies for bids. They are Delta, Met Life, Blue Cross, Guardian, and Altos.
  11. AFSCME did an audit on the payments received to their fund for Dental and vision and found they were owed a substantial amount of money as they had not been receiving the correct amount per person for several years now.
  12. We believe they have done the same to us and we are investigating the discrepancy for our fund as well.
  13. Next Meeting will be on February 27, 2025.

Committee Reports

  1. Budget Committee – Rosa Taormina, Jenna Shales, & Seth Bean
  2. Committee on Professional Development – Vacant
  3. Special Committees:
    • Committee on Legislative Action – Susan McNeil, Seth Bean
    • Committee on Health & Safety – Susan McNeil
  4. Negotiations – Contract Committee
  5. Employee Relations Committee (ERC) as per the APA CBA – Brian Cahillane, Jane Decatur, & Rosa Taormina
    • Nominations & Elections Committee – Vacant. Will need to be constituted after contract is ratified.

Old/New Business

  1. FAQ of the Month for the Website for December – Nothing Suggested

Institutional Issues

Information has been redacted.

Announcements

  1. None

Adjournment

  1. Motion to Adjourn made at Not Applicable
    • by: NA
    • 2nd by: NA
    • Vote: NA
    • Action: NA
  2. Motion to Adjourn made at 10:47am 11/15/2024
    • by: S. McNeil
    • 2nd by: R. Taormina
    • Vote: Unanimous
    • Action: Motion Carries

APA Meeting Schedule 2024-2025:

EventTimeDateFormatLocation
APA Executive Board10:00amFriday, September 20, 2024RemoteZoom
APA Executive Board10:00amFriday, October 18, 2024RemoteZoom
APA Executive Board10:00amFriday, November 15, 2024HybridZoom/TBD
Annual State-wide Membership12:00pmFriday, November 15, 2024HybridZoom/TBD
APA Executive Board10:00amFriday, December 20, 2024HybridZoom
APA Executive Board10:00amFriday, January 17, 2025RemoteZoom
APA Executive Board10:00amFriday, February 21, 2025RemoteZoom
APA Executive Board10:00amFriday, March 21, 2025RemoteZoom
APA Executive Board10:00amFriday, April 18, 2025RemoteZoom
APA Executive Board10:00amFriday, June 20, 2025In-personTBD
APA Meeting Schedule 2024-2025

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