Home > Southern Administrative Heads Conference Call – September 2, 2016

Southern Administrative Heads Conference Call – September 2, 2016

Notes

Southern Administrative Heads
Conference Call
September 2, 2016

Participants:
Greg Bohach (chair), Mark Hussey, Mark Cochran, Nancy Cox, Paul Patterson, Tom Coon, Gary Lemme, Tim Cross, L. Washington Lyons, Alan Grant, Ray McKinney, Alton Thompson, Valerie Giddens, Marvin Burns, Mark Latimore, and Eric Young

  1. Administrative Heads Rules of Operations change on non-payment of BAA assessments and other items – Greg Bohach and Mark Hussey
    1. Some institutions are only paying selected assessments
      1. Proposed change will exclude an institution that does not pay all assessments from participating in any aspect of the BAA and its Sections, including CARET
      2. Non-payment penalty can be waived by AHS Executive Committee for reasons of financial difficulty or other extenuating circumstances
    2. Add Canadian institutions which belong to the Association of Canadian Faculties of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine to the BAA and appropriate Sections
    3. Change the vote needed to amend Rules to be 2/3 of those voting.
    4. Eddie will send ballots out soon after Labor Day, it’s important to vote because currently we still need 2/3 of those eligible to vote for the vote to be valid

  2. United Soybean Board template agreement terms & conditions – Mark Cochran and Greg Bohach
    1. Arkansas Soybean Promotion Board has indicated that they will terminate the state research agreement because it does not comply with USB standards
    2. USB claims they can pull state funds back to the national level if the state board agreement doesn’t meet their standards
    3. USB wants to have all of their “gold standard” terms in each agreement
    4. USB legal counsel has told that boards they should consider contracting with entities other than the university, even if the university has the expertise needed
    5. Mississippi State Board contracts out of state now, but only when the expertise doesn’t exist at MSU
    6. AR State Board tried challenging USB’s imposition of agreement terms, but backed down when USB threatened to pull the state funds or have AMS do that.
    7. USDA proposed rule on soybean and cattle check-offs would allow some of the funds to go to the national level rather than state
    8. We’re starting to see more state commodity boards trying to add increasingly restrictive terms to agreements, particularly related to IP
    9. It may be helpful if the AHS and AES/CES directors could jointly develop a set of best practices terms for commodity agreements

  3. Healthy Food Systems, Healthy People Funding Strategy update – Eric Young
    1. Rick Mertens, TAMU, is leading the funding strategy development
    2. The draft strategy currently has four recommended actions for the BAA and its Sections
      1. Facilitate public-private partnerships across agriculture and health care
      2. Support the National Microbiome Initiative
      3. Encourage federal funding proposals (RFA’s) to target the HFSHP goals
      4. Expand the Pipeline of Students and Professionals for Integrated Healthy Food Systems Programs
    3. Strategy currently also has four recommended funding proposals
      1. Healthy Food Systems Research Program – $80 M/yr
      2. Healthy Food Systems Capacity Program Integration Initiative – $25 M/yr
      3. National Pilot Program for Delivery of Evidence-Based Prevention and Care – $5 M/yr
      4. Expand CDC’s High Obesity Rate Counties Program – $10 M/yr
    4. Rick and other committee members are meeting with NIFA and other federal agency leaders to determine if the proposed funding strategies are realistic
    5. An initial meeting with Dionne Toombs and Denise Elben from NIFA was encouraging

  4. Deferred Maintenance Funding Strategy update – Tom Coon
    1. Draft strategy has two approaches
      1. Improve stewardship of new facilities and those in good shape through sharing best practices and obtaining full IDC for maintenance, particularly from USDA
      2. Renovate or replace problem facilities through a significant grant program of $1 B/yr over 10 years, which would require a local match
    2. Good support across LGU system for this strategy, provided the grant program does not in any way diminish the current NIFA funding lines
    3. NIFA has advised us to take out the dollar amount and talk about the concept of a facilities grant program at this point

  5. Feedback on Spring joint meeting and potential future mini-Land-grant – All
    1. The four southern regional associations have met in various combinations over the past few years, but all four have not met together since 2002
    2. A mini-Land-grant meeting may be worth considering once every two or three years, but probably not every years.
    3. Earliest this might be feasible would be in 2018 and it should avoid the state’s legislative season, so probably needs to be in summer or early fall
    4. Eric will ask the SAAESD about this possibility at their meeting in late September to get their initial reaction. He’ll also see if Ron could do the same.
    5. If the reaction is favorable, we will try to arrange a meeting a some key people during the APLU conference in Austin

  6. Other agenda items
    1. NIFA Capacity Funds Study
      1. NIFA has contracted with Teconomy to do an impact study of Capacity funds
      2. The regional Executive Directors have reviewed a survey that will be distributed soon after Labor Day
      3. After their initial review and comments, Teconomy has decided to split the survey into three parts, one each for the AHS, AES, and CES
      4. The AHS will receive links to all three surveys in an email and will be asked to forward the AES and CES links to the appropriate directors