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Vol. LXIIII • Issue 3
THELOQUITUR.COM
Thursday Nov. 17, 2022
Professors battle for ‘token’ retirement benefits By Marcus Alvarez Managing Editor
E
ven before Cabrini Interim President Helen Drinan alerted the community to the school’s dire financial situation, behindthe-scenes ramifications began rumbling. Dr. Marilyn Johnson and Dr. James Hedtke claimed Drinan denied them promised retirement benefits they negotiated with Cabrini’s former president, Donald Taylor. According to Johnson and Hedtke, other faculty, and their friends, the pair have sought legal counsel in the matter. Private negotiations While Johnson and Hedtke declined to detail the negotiated deals, Drinan described the deals as unfair. “I’m not continuing an unfair practice, nor am I in a position to make that funding given our financial situation,” she said. These compensation deals for retirement should not be confused with Cabrini’s longstanding 403(b) contribution retirement plan. In the plan, the school donates 4% of an employee’s base annual salary and matches up to 3% of the employee’s contribution. Drinan
explained that people can put in as much money as they like up to Internal Revenue Service limits, or nothing at all, while still receiving Cabrini’s contributions.
check every two weeks for a year. I worked 50 years, but I didn’t get any more than if I’d worked 25 years. It was capped at one year max of pay,” Zurek said.
She said, under previous administrations, “When certain members of the faculty were about to retire, some of them asked for extra compensation, and some were given it. Some were given more than a year of severance. Some were given less than a year of severance, some were given a year of severance.”
According to Zurek, in 2020, faculty were told that in the 2021-22 academic year, those who accepted the agreement would receive, “two weeks of base salary for each year of service, $2,000 for or in lieu of health insurance, $2,000 for or in lieu of outplacement services, tuition benefits for four years, lifetime use of Cabrini facilities, including the Dixon Center and the library, and retention of employee’s Cabrini email address and e-mail account.” He said several staff members and some faculty took the deal.
She further explained that other faculty members have not equally received these sums, and staff weren’t even considered for deals the faculty received. Drinan said, “We have not honored such requests from everybody. And we have also not offered such things to everybody.” Sources say Hedtke and Johnson received the same deal as previous senior faculty who retired. Part of that deal included a year’s salary. Dr. Jerry Zurek, an English and communications professor who retired in 2021, took one of these deals, referred to as a voluntary separation agreement. “If you worked 25 years, you’d get a pay-
Lawful pitchforks raised Johnson, professor in the writing and narrative arts department, started at Cabrini in 1966. She is one of its longest-serving professors. On the advice of counsel, she did not wish to comment on her case. However, she said she does not understand Drinan’s reasoning on packages being given out unevenly when retired senior faculty members have received evenly distributed ones.
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The fire that wasn’t: Founders Hall classes disrupted by smoke By John Rader News Editor At roughly 10:45 the morning of Nov. 10, a fire alarm went off in Founders Hall and the building was evacuated. This is the second time in the last two weeks Founders Hall experienced a fire alert. The first time, a faulty smoke detector was to blame. Rumors circulated throughout the Cabrini community as students and faculty alike reported seeing smoke. The Radnor Fire department was on the scene about 15 minutes after the alarm was sounded, and it took an additional 45 minutes before anyone was allowed to re-enter the building. An unexpected disturbance The cause of the fire? Well, there was no fire. “The source of the fire alarm was dust and debris that entered the 2nd floor due to our team using a backpack blower to remove leaves, dust and debris from the ramp,” Patricia Smith, director of facilities, said. The dust and debris entered the building through an open door, which triggered the smoke alarm. Smoke alarms cannot differentiate smoke, which is why the dust from the backpack triggered the alarms. Smith apologized for the inconvenience which led to class being disrupted and said that for future instances the maintenance staff will use brooms as opposed to backpack blowers to clean up any dust. “I was supposed to have a presentation that I prepared all night for,” Eddie Martin, senior communication major, said. His presentation is now pushed back until next week. The disturbance occurred towards the end of the 9:50 a.m. block of classes, and cut the 11:05 a.m. block of classes in half, which led some professors to cancel classes.
A haze of confusion The whole ordeal lasted longer than it should have due to the outside source of smoke, as the Radnor Fire Department, and Cabrini maintenance spent roughly 45 minutes searching the building for where the fire supposedly started. “We could not locate the source,” Joe Maguire, Radnor fire chief said. His team was certain that the haze of smoke was coming from the second floor, but not where the smoke entered the building. The dust and debris from the backpack blowers was so dense that it trickled down to the main lobby of Founders Hall. This haze filled up the first and second floors. The Radnor Fire Department was able to dissipate the smoke in the building, and then coordinated with Cabrini officials to make sure that Founders Hall did not lose power. “Considering we have been out here for over an hour, I am just hoping that I can get to go back to my office,” Christy Leigh, director of the Accessibility Resource Center, said.
Photo by Thomas Ryan.
This sense of confusion was palpable throughout the hundreds of students and faculty members watching the firefighters. Everyone assumed this time there was a legitimate fire, and not just another false alarm. One can only hope that, moving forward, Founders Hall can enjoy the rest of its semester without any more alarms.