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Good afternoon! I would like to call this Special Meeting
of the Board of Trustees
of the City of New York to Order.
I appreciate everyone making the time on short notice
to be here.
We will be going into Executive Session
to discuss a personnel matter
at the conclusion of this First Public Session
and the board will reconvene
after the Executive Session in Second Public Session.
Could I take a moment just to request
that everyone mute your cellphone or Blackberry,
thank you!
This meeting is being webcast live
in the Board Committee Room,
room 770 designated as the over flow room
which is across the hallway on this floor.
We have several individuals at the table here today
who are here for their first board meeting.
On behalf of the board,
I would like to welcome trustees,
James Malinero and Barry Schwartz.
This is also the first meeting,
I believe for the Interim Executive Vice Chancellor
and University Provos, Julia Rigley.
Welcome!
Interim Queens College President, Evangelos Gizis
and Cuny Graduate School of Journalism,
Dean Sarah Bartlett.
Welcome to all of you
and we are looking forward to working with you.
I'd now like to adjourn this first public session
and we will go into a brief Executive Session.
We will reconvene after the Executive Session.
0231
Good afternoon again.
I would like to call this second public session of the day
to order and thank you once again
for all in attendance on short notice.
The purpose of this session
and I will introduce a resolution in a moment
is to discuss a resolution concerning the appointment
of a new chancellor for CUNY.
Before I do introduce the resolution,
I want to thank very warmly indeed the search committee
for the chancellor's search.
This is a group that worked extremely diligently
over a period of some months, many meetings,
lots of reviewing of candidates
and I want to thank the members of the committee.
The president's representatives were
Alyssa Cojuangco of City College, thank you,
and Felix Matos Rodriguez of Hostos.
We had faculty members, Terry Martell,
who is the Chair of the University Faculty Senate
and distinguished professor, Robert Paaswell of City College.
We had two students who made great contributions,
Jennifer Fernandez from Queen's College
and Mohammad Arshad,
who is chair of the University Student Center.
The alumni were represented by Sy Sternberg,
who is very well known to a lot of us,
the retired chairman and CEO of New York Life Insurance Company.
And we had a large number of trustees,
in addition to myself.
I served as the chair of the committee
but I do want to thank
Phil Barry, Wellington Chan, Valerie Biel, Brian Overfell,
Rita DiMartino, Peter Panteleo, Carol Robles Roman,
and Charles Schwarder
for working very diligently.
I think the committee received strong assistance
from our search consultants, Isaacson Miller.
And in addition, we had terrific contributions
from our former chancellor, Matt Goldstein
and Colombia University Provost Emeritus, Jonathan Cole.
We considered more than 50 outstanding individuals
as possible candidates and had,
as I said in depth discussions with about a dozen of those,
dinners and whatnot.
We have come as a committee to unanimous recommendation.
I think held with some enthusiasm by...
by each member of the committee
and in addition,
and the committee's sole recommendation to the board
is that President James B. Milliken
who is been the head of the University of Nebraska system,
for this his tenth, for nine years
be recommended to the board.
In addition, board members not on the committee
have had a chance to meet with J.B. Milliken
and get to know him
and they are also very enthusiastic about it
and J.B. has had a chance to sit down
with a number of the senior people here at the chancellory
and discuss where the university is,
what needs to be done and so on, with them.
So reflecting all of that hard work
and very, very strong indeed unanimous consents us few.
I'd like to move the following resolution,
before I do, let me say that
we have been very fortunate at Cuny
to have Bill Kelly step in as our interim chancellor.
He is not only kept us on an even keel
but moved the university forward.
He has several more months of service in that capacity.
We will thank him in a formal way,
more toward the end of his time as interim chancellor
but I just want to say for myself
and I know speak for the entire board,
Bill, "You have done just a superb job here,
keeping the university moving forward."
It's been great to work with
and I look forward to working with you in the months ahead
as you continue as interim chancellor.
I would now like to move the adoption
of the following resolution,
it is titled,
the City University of New York, designation of chancellor.
Where as the search committee for a new chancellor
of the City University of New York
diligently conducted a comprehensive national search
and where as the committee composed of trustees,
college presidents, faculties, students and alumni
unanimously recommended the University of Nebraska President
James B. Milliken
for appointment as our seventh Cuny chancellor
and where as all the trustees of the board
have had a chance to interview
and get to know President Milliken
and where as President Milliken is a national leader
in public higher education
with extensive academic and administrative experience
at local state, federal and international levels.
Therefore, be it resolved
that James B. Milliken be appointed chancellor
of the City University of New York,
effective on a date mutually agreed upon
prior to June 1, 2014
at salary to be determined by the chairperson
subject to financial ability
and in addition
that he be appointed distinguished professor
with tenure
at the Cuny School of Law.
May I have a second please,
Second.
I have couple of letters
that I would like to read from trustees who could not be here
but who wanted their positions on this matter
to be reflected in the record.
Dear chairperson Schmidt,
regretfully I am out of town on business
and will not be able to attend the special board meeting
on Wednesday, January 15,
as you know, I participated with great enthusiasm
on the search committee
for a new chancellor of the City University of New York
and recommend without reservation James B. Milliken,
President of the University of Nebraska
as our next chancellor.
I very much believe that he would bring to the position
an impressive blend of academic and administrative experience
a commitment to the mission of the university
and the ability to build on the progress we have made
over the past 15 years.
Please convey my appreciation to all of the trustees
for their dedication to the advancement of Cuny.
Sincerely, Philip Barry, who is our vice chairperson.
The second letter,
Dear Beno,
although I cannot be with you and the trustees
at today's special board meeting.
Please be advised that I am strongly supportive
of the designation of President James B. Milliken
as chancellor of CUNY.
I commend the search committee for its excellent work
and very much look forward
to working with our new chancellor
to further advance the mission of Cuny.
Please extend my best wishes to everyone in attendance.
Sincerely, Freida Foster.
May I have a second on the resolution?
Second.
We will have brief discussion
which I would like to kick off
by saying James B. Milliken
has had a very distinguished career
and a lot of success during his nine years
as President of the University of Nebraska.
The university enrollment stands at all time high.
Milliken has worked sedulously
to increase the number of core students, minority students
who come to the university and he has worked very hard
to make sure that large number of them are successful.
Indeed, he has been so successful at that,
that he has help move Nebraska
from ranking 17th among the states
to where it currently ranks 7th among the states
in the percentage of its population that go to college.
He has also been tremendously effective in fund raising.
He has set private fund raising records
for the university in recent years.
He has built the sponsored research.
The capacity of the university
to over $300,000,000.00 a year
and he has been able to establish
a number of new nationally imminent research enterprises
around water safety, food security, and other matters
that are very relevant to the future of Nebraska.
He had a very distinguished career
at the University of North Carolina
where he was in charge of strategy
and their political relationship.
He became very close friends of Governor Jim Hunt
at North Carolina
who is a tremendous fan of J.B. Milliken.
And I think it's fair to say
that J.B. is tremendously enthusiastic about CUNY.
He loves the CUNY mission.
He is devoted to the idea of CUNY
as a world class urban university
providing access to large numbers of students
who might not otherwise have a chance for higher education.
He loves the work we do with immigrants
and others for whom English is not their native language.
He is very impressed with
how well we serve students with disabilities
and he would like to build on that.
And he turned down several other
very prominent public university leadership offers,
far better compensated I would have
in order to come to CUNY
because this is really the place that he wants to be.
So I think, my opinion,
we have an absolutely outstanding candidate
who is very enthusiastic about the university.
Eagerly looking forward to
working with the board, with the faculty,
with students, with the alumni
and with the political leadership
here at the state and in the city
to advance our cause.
So there is not a more important thing
that any board of trustees ever does
than appoint a chief executive officer for the organization.
This is one of the most important things
this board has done in the past 14 years
but I feel very, very good about the quality of the outcome
that I have put before you in that resolution.
Is there further discussion?
If not, are you ready for the question?
All in favor please say, Aye.
Aye.
Any opposed? Abstentions?
The resolution unanimously carries.
Thank you very much.
That concludes our business for this special meeting.