Association of Professional Administrators

Minutes 2022-12

Date/Time: Friday, December 16, 2022 at 10:00am

Location: MTA Office in Worcester & Zoom Room

Present

APA Statewide

  • Seth Bean, President
  • Susan McNeil, Vice President
  • Mark Powers, Secretary
  • Aaron Childs, Membership Coordinator (Non-voting)
  • Gerol Petruzella, Web Manager (Non-voting)
  • Catherine Santiago, MTA Field Representative (Non-voting)

APA Chapter Presidents

  • Seth Bean, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts
  • Renee Bernier, Bridgewater State University
  • Brian Cahillane, Westfield State University
  • Jane Decatur, Framingham State University
  • Sherry Horeanopoulos, Fitchburg State President
  • Susan McNeil, Massachusetts College of Art & Design
  • Rosa Taormina, Salem State University
  • Edward Vacha, Massachusetts Maritime Academy

Guests

  • none

Absent

APA Statewide

  • Maria Brunelle, Treasurer (Non-Voting)
  • Roberta James, MTA Field Representative (Non-voting)

APA Chapter Presidents

  • Peter Fenuccio, Worcester State University

Call to Order

  • 10:04 am

Approval of Minutes

  • Per agreement of the Executive Board, the Minutes of the November 17 & 18, 2022 Executive Board Meeting were approved electronically on December 9, 2022.
    Thank you to Sherry Horeanopoulos for acting as Recording Secretary for these minutes.

Public Comments

  • None.

President’s Report – Seth Bean

  1. See New Business
  2. C. Santiago
    1. MTA Bargaining Summit, February 3 & 4 held in Boston.
    2. MTA’s New Member Organizer, Josh Levitt. Please complete doodle by end of day 12/21/2022 if interested in meeting with them regarding the New Member Liaison positions available.

Treasurer’s Report – Maria Brunelle

  1. Payroll due on Tuesday, December 20, 2022 by 12:00pm.
  2. Approval of November 2022 Treasurer’s Report
  • Amendments: None
  • Motion to approve membership report as presented/amended made:
  • by: S. McNeil 2nd by: S. Horeanopoulos
  • Vote: Unanimous Action: Motion Carries

Membership and Data – Aaron Childs

  1. 1314 Overall Membership since November 2022. A Decrease of 11.
  2. 156 Non-Dues Paying Member. A Decrease of 1 since November 2022.
  3. Will be performing an audit of the membership database against the State Roster and MTA to clean up any discrepancies and to ensure APA is not being overcharged by MTA.
  4. APA Contract Appendix B Payroll Dues Deduction Authorization still has SSN as a required field.

Website – Gerol Petruzella

  1. 1 November – 30 November 2022
    1. Website Overview – Users. During November 2022, maapa.org saw decreases in users and sessions relative to October 2022 (Figure 1). The most popular days/times for users to visit the site were Tuesdays between 11a and 2p ET, and Wednesdays between 10a and 4p ET (Figure 2).
    2. Website Overview – Traffic. Traffic to maapa.org was predominantly direct traffic or the result of a Google search (Figure 3). The top 10 most visited pages are indicated (Figure 4).
    3. Website Overview – Other. 
      • I performed content updates on the site including:
        1. Updated meeting minutes.
      • On 26 June, Google Analytics notified that the current “Universal Analytics” product (which we use for maapa.org) will sunset on 1 July 2023. Web managers are encouraged to move to their new product, Google Analytics 4, as soon as possible. This will require a property setup process to implement and transition, to maintain data continuity. (link to Google’s blog post about the analytics transition.)
      • I continued to maintain an internal WordPress instance of the site in parallel with the “live” Drupal instance. As the Drupal instance falls further behind in security updates, I continue to recommend transitioning to the WordPress CMS as soon as possible. I also suggest that aligning the CMS transition with the Analytics transition will minimize both labor and disruption.

Health and Welfare Fund Report – Susan McNeil

  1. December meeting cancelled – no report. Next Meeting will be in late January (hopefully).
  2. https://www.mass.edu/forfacstaff/healthwelfare/home.asp
  3. R. Bernier inquired if APA could negotiate for a different level of coverage particularly for dental benefits. The only (outdated) reference to H&W in the APA contract is Article VII.F Health & Welfare.

Committee Reports

Budget Committee – Rosa Taormina & Seth Bean

Employee Relations Working Group –

Professional Development – Edward Vacha

Special Committees:

  1. Committee on Legislative Action – Susan McNeil, Seth Bean, & Sherry Horeanopoulos
  2. Committee on Health & Safety – Renee Bernier & Susan McNeil
  3. Negotiations – Contract Committee
  4. Employee Relations Committee – Brian Cahillane, Jane Decatur, & Rosa Taormina

Old/New Business

  1. FAQ of the Month for the Website for December – nothing discussed
  2. Silent Negotiators for next Bargaining session. Does it require a change to the bylaws? Silent Reps vs. Silent Observers – decision should be made before next negotiation. Silent Reps are actually members of the Bargaining teams (would be accomplished most cleanly by changing the bylaws – would not allow Management to object). To be discussed in December.
  3. Motion 2022.12.16-01
    Move to amend the APA Statewide Bylaws to expand the definition of the Negotiation Team Article XI Committees Section 4. Titles and Duties A. Negotiating Team.
    by: S. Bean 2nd by: S. Horeanopoulos
    Vote: 9-0-0 Action: Motion Passes
  4. ARTICLE XI – Committees
    Section 4. Titles and Duties
    A. Negotiating Team:
    (1) shall negotiate with the employer. Negotiating team shall consist of all voting members of the Executive Board. In addition, members of the Executive Board shall recommend, for approval by the Executive Board, dues-paying members to serve as silent representatives on the negotiating team. All dues-paying members of the association shall be eligible to serve as an approved silent representative.
    C. Any other proposed Bylaw changes need to be presented the E-Board on January 16, 2022.
    D. Proposal between Worcester State University and APA (MTA/NEA) regarding APA members in the Public Safety Department (Campus Police). Should this be moved to Impact Bargaining as all of the campuses are experiencing staffing issues for police officers who are AFCSME-designated positions and APA unit members are being asked to work shifts without compensation due to being in salaried positions.
  5. Motion 2022.12.16-02
    Motion to demand to bargain for APA Public Safety Officers to be compensated at an overtime hourly rate when being asked to work AFSCME members shifts as they are outside of the APA unit member’s normal hours and scope of duties.
    by: S. McNeil 2nd by: B. Cahillane
    Vote: 9-0-0 Action: Motion Passes
  6. Survey for Bargaining should go out in January. Design a new one or modify the previous one? Prefill it to give the membership a way to rate/rank a list of items or free form and let the membership submit what is important to them. Maybe focus on Articles 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 11 as part of the survey.
    Create new page on website to house the survey, the items that were proposed last time for negotiation, the items being considered for this bargaining season, etc.

Institutional Issues

Announcements

  • None

Adjournment

  1. Motion to Adjourn made at 1:16pm by: S. Horeanopoulos
    2nd by: S. McNeil
    Vote: Unanimous
    Action: Motion Carries

Next APA Meetings:

  • APA Executive Board | 10:00am | Friday, December 16, 2022 | In-Person | Worcester MTA Office
  • APA Executive Board | 9:00am | Friday, January 20, 2023 | Virtual | Zoom
  • APA Executive Board | 9:00am | Friday, February 17, 2023 | Virtual | Zoom
  • APA Executive Board | 9:00am | Friday, March 17, 2023 | Virtual | Zoom
  • APA Executive Board | 9:00am | Friday, April 21, 2023 | Virtual | Zoom
  • APA Executive Board | 10:00am | Friday, June 16, 2023 | In-Person | TBD

Topics for next round of negotiations:

  • Salary Compression
  • Longevity
  • Workload
  • Sick Bank Leave Committee Language

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