Staff Assembly releases its budget proposals
By Eric Onstad
Staff Writer
The Staff Assembly, remaining optimistic in the face of massive planned employee cuts, took the offensive Wednesday and released its own budget recommendations at an open forum Wednesday.
The assembly is a 60-member elective group that represents all non-faculty employees on campus.
Harvey Stedman, assembly president and associate dean of the College of Continuing Education, encouraged the 30 assembly members in attendance to get involved in the seven-month-old group’s efforts as he explained the recommendations outlined in the report.
“(The reductions) ought to be done in a multi-year process, not a one-time cut,” Stedman said.
The long-term process outlined in the report would strive to increase staff efficiency, resulting in “a higher quality but smaller staff,” the report said.
A higher-salary structure would decrease the “unacceptable” staff turnover rate of 30 percent to 35 percent, it said.
The report recommended an incentive program to encourage departments to make their areas more efficient and make cuts in their budgets.
When departments find waste and eliminate it, they should be rewarded by retaining some of the saved funds, the report said.
“The (present) policy penalizes those units which devise ways to reduce staff, rather than providing an incentive to do so,” the report said.
One staff member told the group that individual employees should be consulted for their recommendations for eliminating waste.
“Those working in the department know where the cuts should be made,” said Veronica Brown, from the Data Entry department. But those in charge don’t always know where the waste is, she added.
Some staff members at the meeting were worried that they may not be around to see these proposed changes take place.
“I have this dreadful feeling that they (the administration) are lining us all up, and no one is coining back,” one staff member said.
The staff member, who asked not to be identified, pointed out that the university might use the uncertainty and fear surrounding the cuts to force salary reductions.
“It is not right or ethical for the university to take advantage (of the situation),” she said. "It stinks, there is no sense of integrity.” Another staff member said the uncertainty about the cuts is
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Porter: a director caught in a system gone awry?
Appleton says yes, but critics attack her ability
By Wendell Mobley
Assistant City Editor
A woman slight in stature with piercing brown eyes, Pamela Porter hardly fits the mold of what one might call a controversial figure.
Yet this administrator has been the subject of much criticism for her work as director of the Norman Topping Student Aid Fund and later of Black Student Services.
Her adversaries say she has been unable to manage her university offices — both of which are overseen by the Office of Student Affairs — efficiently. They say that she cannot communicate with co-workers or with the people the offices cater to.
The changes she implemented in BSS this fall sparked protests from the Black Student Union and brought numerous calls for her ouster.
Her supporters, however, feel that Porter is a competent administrator and that she will succeed in her work if given the chance.
Porter's supporters, including James Appleton, vice president of Student Affairs, say that the problems in the BSS and the Topping Fund are not related.
They say that she is a victim — an administrator who inherited a labyrinth of problems and was expected to solve them overnight.
Regardless of which side one believes, the story of Pamela Porter suggests that the Topping Fund and BSS have been in a state of chaos for some time and that the administration has been insensitive to complaints about the two offices.
Porter’s campus relationship
Porter’s relationship with the university has been a long one. She has earned three degrees in sociology from the university, the most recent one being a doctorate in 1976.
She came to work on campus after serving as an assistant professor of anthropology and sociology at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
Porter has also served as an assistant professor in the department of Pan African Studies at California State University, Los Angeles.
Before being appointed to the BSS directorship in October, she served as interim director of the Norman Topping Student Aid Fund from July to December of last year.
It w'as with the Topping Fund that Porter began
experiencing notable problems.
The problems mushroomed to such an extent that Jeffrey Barnes, then chairman of the fund’s governing board, sent a memo to Appleton, the man responsible for hiring Porter.
(At that time the governing board had 11 student, four university and two alumni representatives. The board’s role at that time and presently is to establish policy guidelines and to perform additional tasks such as selecting an interim director.
(The Topping Fund is designed to assist lowr-in-come disadvantaged students who demonstrate academic merit and financial need.)
PAMELA PORTER
The memo, dated Nov. 11, details the frustration experienced by the fund’s governing board and by Barnes in particular:
The relationship between the interim director (Porter) and the entire Board has eroded.
She has not met the conditions of the position, she has done no counseling for the recipients or has she administered to their needs this semester, she has not cooperated with the Board, also important office work has been deliberately held up, Topping Fund monies have been spent on personal items, and there are several other complaints.
It is clear that this situation will have to be dealt with by the Board, and as the Board hired her, will most likely fire her — I thought that you would assist in resolving the problem before it got to that point.
Appleton responds
Appleton discredited the memo.
“Jeffrey Barnes was pressured by a director who had been released, to write this (memo) and subsequently changed his opinion,” Appleton said.
“If you contact Jeffrey Barnes, he’ll tell you he no longer feels that way and that his opinion has changed.”
Barnes, contacted at his Washington, D.C., office, did not indicate a change of opinion.
“I felt that the scholars were suffering in other ways additional to a lack of counseling,” Barnes said, commenting on the memo.
“People weren't getting enough money,” Barnes said. “The money was there, it just wasn’t given out. Some of them (the scholarship recipients) had to work more than a student should, or had to take additional loans.”
One such student, Barnes said, is George Cole, a Topping Fund recipient and a member of the governing board.
Cole, a senior and a Topping Fund recipient for two years, said Porter failed to award him enough for this year.
He received approximately $4,000 last year, a figure based on 16 units. He received approximately $1,800 based on 12 units for this year. The governing board allotted him an additional $900 this semester.
“I was short (of money) at the time,” Cole said, referring to the amount of money Porter awarded him
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Volume XCI Number 45
University of Southern California	Thursday March 18, 1982
Zumberge urged to reconsider Huettich, Dunn dismissal case
By Marc Igler
Staff Writer
The Faculty Senate passed a resolution Wednesday urging President James H. Zumberge to reconsider the grievance cases of former assistant professors Gunner Huettich and Doris Dunn.
The motion advises Zum-
‘We’re really dealing with a sense of fair play and common sense. ’
berge to return the cases to the Tenure and Privileges Hearing Board and to base his final decision on the findings of the board.
In addition, the motion calls for the tenure board to base its decision on the grievance principles and procedures currently being drafted by the Faculty Senate Executive Board and en-
dorsed by the American Association of University Professors.
Last week, Huettich, a former assistant professor in the German Department, and Dunn, a former assistant professor in Library and Information Management, received letters from Zumberge stating that no new evidence had been brought forward in either case and that his decision for dismissal would stand.
“We’re not dealing with the substantive matter of these cases but the application of nationally accepted standards for grievances. We’re really dealing with a sense of fair play and common sense,” said John Elliot, a Faculty Senate member and an economics professor.
Huettich’s case deals with the granting of tenure while Dunn’s case involves a reappointment decision.
Huettich, whose dispute with the university has dragged on for over two
years, urged the Faculty Senate to reach a decision on the grievance cases soon.
“This dispute has prevented me from doing things for two years. I’m $10,000 in debt and still unemployed. I urge the Faculty Senate to reach a bottom line with the university,” Huettich said.
‘This motion calls for the president of the university to treat us like men and women. . . ’
Gibson Reeves, a member of the Faculty Senate and a professor of astonomy, also supported the motion, which Aced very little opposition.
“This motion calls for the professor of astronomy, also to treat us like men and women and not to hide behind a bureaucracy,” Reeves said.