Date: 
02/14/2013 10:00 am to 11:30 am
Location: 
128 Kidder Hall
Agenda: 
  1. Discussion with Brian Thorsness about Deferred Maintenance, Maintenance and Related Issues
  2. Re-consideration of Category I proposal to Rename B.S. in Forest Management to B.S. in Forestry #85162 – Walt Loveland
    • The proposers really think they need to spend a million dollars for the name change.
Minutes: 
  1. Discussion with Brian Thorsness, Executive Director of Campus Services and Business Operations, about Deferred Maintenance, Maintenance and Related Issues
    The BFP group had a wide-ranging discussion with Brian about several issues. Among the points discussed were: 
    • Deferred Maintenance – At present OUS’s deferred maintenance need is about 600 M$. The largest portion of this need is at OSU, in part, due to the fact that 60% of OSU’s buildings are over 50 years old. OSU’s estimated deferred maintenance budget is 180-250 M$. In the next biennium, OSU is expected to receive 8.5 M$ to treat this problem (10% of which is reserved for ADA matters). This falls substantially short of the ~ 12+ M$ needed to keep pace with increases in deferred maintenance needs. Thus, the magnitude of this problem will grow with time. Among the issues involved here is the lack of fire suppression in many buildings, the need for seismic retrofitting, and the inadequate campus power grid.
    • The campus power grid was discussed at length. Campus power is primarily from PPL, with some co-generation of electricity at the Energy Center which produces steam for campus heating. There are about six PPL sub-stations that service the OSU campus, with most of the aged wiring being in the utility tunnels. Up to recently, there were discussions for OSU to buy all the campus grid and manage it themselves. This issue may be evolving to a joint program for ownership and maintenance.
    • A number of systematic problems regarding maintenance and deferred maintenance were discussed. OSU does not appear to have a comprehensive risk assessment program to assess the probability of utility or other failures in a given year. OSU has one of the lowest allocations in budgeting among peer institutions for maintenance. Private funding for these expenses is not likely.
    • What can faculty do with regard to this matter? We need to draw more attention to the problems and the likely consequences of neglect. It is clear we are not on the "right fiscal path" to handle maintenance issues and the institution needs to change its budget model accordingly.
  2. Re-consideration of Category I proposal to Rename B.S. in Forest Management to B.S. in Forestry #85162) – Walt Loveland
    This proposal was approved subject to receiving a statement from the Dean of Forestry that he was aware and supportive of the commitment of over one million dollars to support this name change. This statement was received later.