4/2 email

Dear John and Members of the College Council Executive Committee,

I appreciate your writing and sharing your thoughts. I agree that we need to be very intentional in the use of our funds. I am considering options for the best way to move forward in addressing VP Iwama's portfolio including a possible reorganization of my cabinet with a reassignment of responsibilities. I do know that all of Ken's responsibilities should not be assumed by a VP for Facilities and Administration, and that it is necessary for our campus to have a separate VP for Facilities.

As I have written before (Oct 31, 2019),

"CSI may be one of the few campuses with a VP for Facilities but we are unique within CUNY for our expansive campus, physical plant, and the numbers of open ongoing capital projects. We have a history of not aggressively moving forward our capital projects. To solve our challenges in facilities we need a dedicated full time VP focused on facilities. Many of the recent problems in campus maintenance stem from the combined position you describe using cuts in facilities and a hesitancy to move our capital projects forward as methods to balance the budget. This cannot continue to happen. Importantly, I believe that this move has helped us highlight the disparity in resources based on CUNY’s failure to account for our total outdoor square footage. As you are aware, we have had a significant increase in capital funds by noting this disparity. These projects need to be actively managed by a Vice President.”

Now, more than ever before we need a strong VP for Facilities and I can’t imagine how we would have met the challenges of the past few weeks without strong leadership in that area.

Likewise, at some point the School of Education will need strong leadership to transition to the new modality of distance learning as well as for the new Ed.D program. I know that the Provost is looking at how to best address these issues — both short term as well as long terms — for the benefit of our students.

Bill Fritz President