[Advice to Divisional Chair Bruce Madewell 9/11/2002]
In a letter dated 2 July 2002, Senate Chair Jeff Gibeling asked CERJ to comment on the Committee on Academic Personnel's policy on recusal. We have looked at the supporting
documents (various statements of the policy) and have received an additional letter (via e-mail date 10 July 2002) from Linda Bisson, Chair of CAP with some questions for CERJ.
CERJ believes that Academic Senate Bylaw 55 does not permit any Senate committee to forbid its members to vote on personnel cases in their departments -- that is a protected right. CAP is, however, entitled to organize itself and, indeed, has a duty to define policy on conflict of interest. CAP, therefore, has the authority to establish a policy that its members should not vote on a case on which they have already voted in their department. They do not have to adopt this policy, but they may. What they may not do, is to state ex ante that a member of CAP loses the right to vote in the department.
As far as CERJ can tell from the policy statements we have seen, CAPs policy is consistent with these rules.