5.3 Negotiations Team

It is the responsibility of the Negotiations Team to review proposals provided for Trust management services, and to negotiate compensation to the Trust’s professional vendors, managers, and advisors.

The Negotiations Team shall be chaired by a Director. Membership of the team shall be comprised of four Directors, one Certificated Director, one Classified Director, and two Management Directors, selected from within their respective units. Only Negotiations Team members shall participate in the Negotiations Team meetings.

The Negotiations Team shall meet on an as-needed basis on call of the team chair. The team chair shall ensure the notification of the date, time, location and topic of meetings to all team members at least 72 hours prior to the meeting. All four team members must be present for the meeting to take place. Minutes shall be recorded for each meeting, and distributed to the Board of Directors.

A team recommendation may only be forwarded to the Board of Directors based on the consensus model, which involves the following procedure; thumbs up signifies “strong support”, thumbs sideways signifies “live with it”, and thumbs down signifies “unable to support it.” If there is a single thumbs down indication that Director must propose an alternate proposal. If the alternate proposal is not unanimously approved, the original recommendation stands as approved. If there are two or more thumbs down, the recommendation is rejected, and an alternate proposal is not necessary. The Negotiations Team shall report any team activity to the Board of Directors at each meeting.

Approved on: May 19, 2009