Report 2016-122 Recommendations

To improve its budget oversight of CSU, the Legislature should require CSU to submit an annual report that provides information on specific activities that CSU engaged in during the previous year to meet the State's goals for student success.

To improve the oversight of CSU's management personnel, the Chancellor's Office should develop a policy that requires its own divisions and departments and campuses to prepare written justifications for both the purpose and specific number of proposed additional management positions. As appropriate, these should justify the number of management personnel positions to be hired based on a workload staffing analysis and the number of people to be supervised. The Chancellor's Office should also require human resources units to maintain these justifications and make them publicly available to stakeholders when requested. No later than one year following the issuance of this new policy, the Chancellor's Office should begin monitoring its own divisions and departments and campuses to ensure that they are properly justifying all new management personnel hires.

To improve the oversight of CSU's management personnel, the Chancellor's Office should ensure that its own divisions and departments and campuses create, implement, and adhere to a written merit evaluation plan for management personnel in accordance with state regulations. Furthermore, the Chancellor's Office should monitor its own divisions and departments and campuses to ensure that they are complying with their merit evaluation plans and are granting raises to management personnel only based on merit as evidenced by current, documented performance evaluations.

To improve the oversight of CSU's management personnel, the Chancellor's Office should work with campuses, bargaining unit representatives, the Public Employment Relations Board, and others as necessary to come to an agreement on the appropriate classification of coaches. The Chancellor's Office should take into account the concerns that San Diego State has raised about the labor market for these employees.

To ensure effective, consistent budget oversight at CSU campuses, the Chancellor's Office should require campuses to develop and implement budget oversight policies that define the minimum level and frequency of reviews that budget managers are required to perform, including the periodic comparison of budgets to actual spending levels, the types of corrective actions to take when they identify budget anomalies, and the retention of appropriate records of those reviews.

To minimize concerns regarding possible conflicts of interest, the Chancellor's Office should work with the board to develop, approve, and implement an executive compensation policy that expressly prohibits the use of foundation funds to pay campus presidents.

To better ensure the reasonability of the reimbursements CSU pays for relocation and moving expenses, the Chancellor's Office should, by October 2017, place an appropriate cap on the amount it will reimburse CSU executives for relocation and moving expenses, based on either a dollar amount or a percentage of base salary. If the chancellor authorizes a reimbursement amount greater than this cap, the chancellor should submit a written explanation to the board to justify the payment.

To better ensure the reasonability of the reimbursements CSU pays for relocation and moving expenses, the Chancellor's Office should, by October 2017, revise its policy to require campuses to place an appropriate cap on the amount they will reimburse campus staff for relocation and moving expenses, based on either a dollar amount or a percentage of base salary. If the campus president authorizes a reimbursement amount greater than this cap, the president should submit a written explanation to the chancellor to justify the payment.

To better ensure the reasonability of the reimbursements CSU pays for relocation and moving expenses, the Chancellor's Office should, by October 2017, follow up with the campuses to ensure that they have sufficiently complied with its policy regarding the adoption of thresholds and caps for reimbursing staff for relocation and moving expenses and that those thresholds and caps are reasonable. If necessary, the Chancellor's Office should provide more exact guidance to the campuses on how to establish these thresholds and caps.

The Chancellor's Office should finish developing the Common Human Resources System and implement it as scheduled by December 2019.

Once it receives the results of its consultant's study on executive compensation, the Chancellor's Office should collaborate as soon as possible with interested parties, such as the LAO, to develop methodologies for future compensation comparisons that consider total compensation.

Within six months, the Chancellor's Office should revise its policy to clarify when campuses need to obtain indemnifications from management personnel who will be on paid administrative leave and should begin monitoring campuses to ensure that they are adhering to its policy.

Within six months, the Chancellor's Office should begin monitoring campuses to ensure that they are complying with the faculty bargaining unit requirements for disclosing outside employment.