Region V Executive Council Report

February 5-6, 2007, Albany, NY

The President, Dave Canaski, has been busy working through the governance structure of the organization. Most notably, he has focused on the treasurer, budget, ethics, and development committees. A formal budget proposal will be presented to Council at the June meeting.

NYSFAAA successfully purchased NYSFAA.org (a “near-miss” domain). People access this website will now be re-directed to NYSFAAA.org.

Conference 2007: NYC

The conference budget was reviewed and accepted by Council.

Novice 2007: SUNY Cobleskill

Novice has been shortened by one day. It will begin on Sunday June 3^rd and end on Friday, June 8^th. Lisa Simpson (HESC) and Bill Mack (R.I.T.) have been aggressively addressing issues that arose from last year’s workshop. Registration will open on the NYSFAAA website around April 1^st. Contact Lisa if you are interested in being on the faculty (and can do the whole week).

Warren Hoffman, President of SUNYFAP (State University of NY Financial Aid Professionals) and Mark Schwartz Training Committee of both SUNFAP and NYSFAAA, met with Council. They are looking for ways in which both organizations can offer joint training events. It was agreed that in both organizations (through Mark’s presence on both committees) should coordinate all training efforts.

A mission statement (which is now posted on the NYSFAAA website) was accepted. The governance committee is now charged with the Strategic Long Range Plan (SLRP). The committee asked that E.C. Hunter Associates be contracted to facilitate the undertaking. This group worked with NYSFAAA when the last SLRP was done in 2000. Council approved the expenditures for the committee’s work. The governance committee is looking for nominations for volunteers to sit on the SLRP committee. The governance committee will select from the group of nominations so that all aspects of NYSFAAA’s membership are adequately represented at the meetings. Anyone interested should contact Irv Bodofsky at SUNY Upstate Health Science Center.

During the September meeting in Buffalo, Council approved a new standing committee on diversity reporting to the 1^st Vice President (membership). Joan Warren was asked to draft language for the Policy and Procedure manual. She presented a draft of the language for the P&P manual at this meeting. The motion to accept the draft language was defeated. President Canaski indicated that he would not appoint anyone to chair this committee.

February is traditionally NYSFAAA’s opportunity to visit the NYS Legislature. The second day was devoted to these visits. I had the opportunity to meet with Senator Jeff Klein and Assemblywoman Amy Paulin’s staff.

The next Executive Council meeting will be held in June.