The COSA meeting was called to order at 8:35 a.m.

Special Order of the Day:

Inman Grimsley reported about the insurance issue at his meeting at St. Simon. He and others had an extended meeting with Commissioner Toal of the Department of Community Health. Right now they are talking about an open enrollment sometime in April, but this is left up to the Chancellor. They have a consulting firm looking into the entire plan to try and work out the problems that may occur. The rate increase is going to be 50 to 100 % if you keep the plan you have now. The PPO is an option not a replacement for our health plan now. This option may not be right for everyone. They will be setting up a web site to keep everyone up to date on a current list of hospitals and doctors. John Anderson asked if we go to a doctor who is not on the list what then? Inman said that you would be reimbursed 60 % of what the bill will be. We still don't know what the premiums will be. You will only be able to change your insurance during open enrollment. Deductibles will change in August, but how they will handle the difference in this area is still not clear. But anything that is changed will be approved or not by the Board of Regents. There will be a Newsletter send out covering this issue.

Approval of Minutes: The minutes were approved.

Treasurer's Report -

No report, so balance is still $1312.00 for March.

Committee Reports

Elections-

Holly Decker reported that we have our current list of all staff employees and putting them in the area of representation for the coming election in April. Any staff employees who would like to serve on COSA can email me hmdecker@valdosta.edu or write to box 7159 COSA/VSU no later than April 1st. This way we can put your name at the top of the list of willing representatives

Employee Recognition- Special order of the day.

Policies/By-Laws- Ruth Salter, chair, handed out a proposed change in the By-Laws. See attached sheet.

Welfare- Hilda Spell reported that the completion day for the new Science/Biology building would be at the end of May 2000. The new balance for the Walkway fund is $477.87 but December has not been posted..

Recycling- No report.

Salary Study- No report.

Reports from the Chair: Debi Parkhill invited Tommye Miller to the COSA meeting because she had a question about the Christmas 2000 holidays. The recommendation that COSA approved was the 25,26,27,28, and 29 th of December 2000. She was concerned that some areas on campus might not have had a say in this recommendation. She wanted COSA to find ways to make sure that everyone had knowledge of this recommendation. COSA had asked each representative to go back to the areas that they represent and ask for input from staff members. Debi said that COSA would check on other ways to get input from all the staff members on campus about any issues that need to be decided by COSA.

Old Business

COSA web page is up to date. We will add the Employee of the Semester nominees and winners to the web page.

The display board and table cover will be address in June.

Staff Appreciation Day final report isn't finished yet.

New Business

Election procedures will be held over to the next meeting.

There being no further discussion or business, the meeting was adjourned at 9:40 am and will meet again on February 8, 2000.