UA Codes and Judicial Committee

CJC Meeting
22 February 2006

Present: Louis Alley, Kim Lewis, Kathleen Rourke, Kathy Zoner, Kevin Clermont

Guest: Brian Chabot

Ex Officio: Linda Falkson

I. Minutes of Previous Meeting

Previous minutes were accepted as written.

Announcement

Deborah Streeter has joined the committee as a faculty member but is not able to attend the meetings on this day and time.

II. News from UA

There was no news from the University Assemblies to report.

III. JA�s suggestions for making people aware of Ombudsman�s oversight over JA�s office

There was a discussion regarding the need for people to fill the hearing boards (several are scheduled). In what is considered an �emergency situation� the committee agreed to let selected (ex: moot court students, interest in law or legal studies background) and highly recommended people sit on a board without going through the usual interview process, with the proviso that the UA agrees and that the person will go through the usual process as time allows.

Kathleen gave a short review of the regular process where the assemblies� office solicits people to apply to sit on the boards prior to the formal interview and recommendation process before appointment by the UA in the spring. It was generally agreed that the Assembly office needs to cast a wider net to get a pool of people. At the same time it is difficult to schedule interviews with the CJC membership.

IV. Hearing & review boards

Brian gave a short review of the role of Hearing board chair: Hearing board chair moderates proceedings, have no vote in the process, and I assumed that it was supposed to be a neutral role. Sometimes the chair makes decisions about admissibility of evidence, but the hearing board makes the real decisions.

Kathleen: I thought neutrality was part of it too, and that’s why it’s a non-voting position

Linda.: I agree with Brian.

Marty: The code seems not to state anything about the neutrality of the hearing board chair (page 45–46)

Brian: I think neutrality is very important. In the closed discussion of the hearing board, it’s important to have someone to moderate the opinions to come to a conclusion rather than having a board entirely divided. Taking sides around the chair is not useful in resolving things.

Kathleen: Code is strong on the fairness even though it doesn’t mention neutrality.

Brian: I felt my role was to bring us to a conclusion which I have trouble doing if I strongly take one side.

Kathy: You kind of become a defacto voting member by swaying the vote. I think that having someone to bring it to a conclusion is important.

Linda: The chair is like a judge. The Panel is like a set of jurors, and it’s not proper if the chair is not acting like a judge.

Marty: I think that the panel members are more like judges.

Linda: The chair is distinct from the role of the panel members. He’s not like a chief justice. He simply has a different role.

Kevin: Can the chair ask questions. If you impose a neutrality standard, then the chair’s questions are limited. In trial practice, the judge can tell the jury what he thinks about the evidence, but he has to let them know that it’s their decision.

Kathleen: So the CJC doesn’t want to change the code to reflect the requirement of neutrality from the hearing board chair?

Brian: The hearing board chair is given a paper to guide them, given by Mary Beth outlining hearing board procedures.

Marty: Page 27 of the code doesn’t stipulate what the chair is supposed to do, under the review board, there is language for a chair, but not for a hearing board. Under page 29 a separate panel for each case shall have 8 members, - the president shall name a chair and have no vote.

The role of the hearing board chair is spread throughout the code. Barbara Krause should look at this.

Linda: The hearing board procedures were last rewritten by the board members in 2003. I can bring written copies later. We give it whenever there is a hearing.

There was some discussion about the role of the administrative chair. The hearing board members appoint a person to act as an administrative chair, separate from the chair of the board

Kathleen: Brian, do you think there should be time limits on when matters should be resolved.

Brian: Sometimes cases can take 1 - 1.5 years. If there is a criminal case, the judicial process at Cornell often waits until it is done. They don’t want to bias anything due to a decision made at Cornell.

Linda: Also, you want to see how the student is being punished. Also, the government could subpoena the Cornell proceedings.

Brian: I think that the hearing and review boards work fairly well.

VI. Code Changes

Kathleen: let’s look at 27–28, 34, 35, What followed was a paragraph by paragraph analysis of those pages.

We want to replace the hearing and review boards with a “hearing and review pool which consists of 45…” The problem is that in other places in the code, it is difficult to replace existing references to these boards which were previously separate.

We want to eliminated the administrative chair to make the code less confusing, and use different language to accomplish the task of the admin chair.

Change:

Faculty members shall be nominated by the dean of the University faculty. For other candidates the university assemblies office shall solicit written applications and the CJC shall nominate candidates to the University Assembly. All nominations are subject to UA confirmation no later than the last regular meeting of the outgoing assembly.

What is the meaning of the senior member of the faculty? Dean of faculty office brings names to the president.

The president shall name a nonvoting member and alternate, both senior members of the faculty and not the university administration, one of whom shall chair each hearing panel.

The university review panel shall consist of three voting members () all drawn from the university hearing board and university review board pool

Changes were made to all of pages 27–28. On pages 34–35 the committee voted through A, stopped at B. A copy of the revised pages 27–28 will be reviewed for a final affirmation vote at the next meeting. The committee will then continue the discussion of changes to pages 34 & 35.

VII. New Business

VIII. Time and dates of meetings for rest of the semester

The next meeting will be at Day Hall at noon on Wednesday, March 15.