MINUTES
EMPLOYMENT BENEFITS COMMITTEE
October 20, 2011
Members Present
Debbie Copp
Brenda Freese - Chair
Don Harrison
Sue-Anna Miller
Jannie Porter
Al Schwarzkopf
Will Wayne
Members Absent
Alisa Dougless
Don Clothier
Aimee Franklin
Suzanne Gilmore
Chad Johnson
Mark Morvant
Frances Wen
Ex Officio Members
Barbara Abercrombie
Julius Hilburn
Nick Kelly
The meeting was called to order at 1:35 by Brenda Freese
I. Approval of Minutes
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The September minutes were approved with no changes.
II. Fidelity Record Keeper
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Nick told the group that the Master Record Keeper project is on schedule.
40% of employees have attended a group meeting and approximately
2,700 an individual meeting, with Fidelity, which is the most Fidelity has
seen. The departments have been instrumental in helping to coordinate
all of the meetings.
423 of 850 Vanguard investors moved their money to the brokerage
account.
Feedback from all campuses has been mostly favorable. Fidelity has
been responsive to any issues presented.
III. OTRS Choice Project
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Prior to July 2011 employees that hired on or after their 45th birthday were
not required to make a choice between the Optional Retirement Plan
(ORP) and the Oklahoma Teachers Retirement System (OTRS).
New TRS administration said this year that a choice is required.
HR sent letters to over 600 employees that fell into this category and set a
deadline of 10/11. A response was received from 100% of the employees
that received the letter. There were no employees defaulted into TRS.
Approximately 25% of those required to make the choice elected TRS.
IV. Annual Enrollment
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All rates were approved by the Board of Regents at the September
meeting.
Benefits Fairs will be October 24th (HSC), October 25th (Tulsa), and
October 26th (Norman)
Open enrollment will run from October 31st through November 11th
HR is working to educate the campus community on the new BlueOptions
PPO networks.
HMO will be more expensive for the first time in 2012. Employees should
carefully examine the true cost of the plans when making elections.
 PPO will still have a higher out of pocket cost if the
employee/dependent uses a lot of services.
Nick reminded the group that Life and LTD will have an open enrollment
which will waive some Evidence of Insurability (EOI) requirements.
BlueCross will be issuing new ID cards for all members.
 ID numbers will not change so there will be no need to worry if
cards are not received by January 1st.
V. Retiree Medical
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Human Resources has had some initial conversation with the governance
and retiree groups from both campuses.
Based on feedback in the last EBC meeting a revised timeline is being
developed.
There have been a number of questions regarding the revised plan.
 How will Coordination of Benefits (COB) work under the new plan?
 Do the dates make sense? Currently the anticipated date of
implementing an age/service premium requirement is 1/1/2015.
 On what date should the COB method change? Initially 1/1/2013
was discussed.
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President Boren has not made a decision on the revised proposal due to
the fact he would like HR to request feedback from the campus one more
time before moving forward.
Meetings will be scheduled after the first of the year for additional
discussion.
 There will be written materials for employees.
 An online presentation will be available.
VI. Tobacco-Free Norman Campus
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VII.
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President Boren has stated the Norman campus will be tobacco free in
2012. There are many reasons to be tobacco free but he cited the health
of the campus community as the primary driver of this initiative.
A committee has been formed which will guide the transition. Dr. Gary
Raskob, Dean of Public Health, is the chair of the committee, Julius
Hilburn, Chief Human Resources Officer, is a member of the committee,
and there is faculty/staff/student representation as well. OU Wellness
Coordinator, Breion Rollins will serve as a resource to the group.
The committee will develop a transition timeline which will likely be in the
range of 6 months to a year.
Within the committee there are three working groups which will address
different aspects of becoming a tobacco free campus:
 Public Events
 South Campus
 Benefits for Cessation
 Employee Health Plan
 Student Health Plan
Updates from the Chief Human Resources Officer
There were no updates this month.
VIII. Other Business
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Debbie told the group that at the last Staff Senate meeting an employee
addressed the committee to inquire about OU amending the leave policy
in order to allow an employee to be off work caring for a domestic partner.
Julius told the committee that HR would look into the matter.
The next regularly scheduled meeting will be November 17, 2011.There being no
other business, the meeting was adjourned at 2:30 p.m.