Sonoma State University

Campus Safety Committee

Charter

The Sonoma State University (SSU) Campus Safety Committee shall serve the campus community as an advocacy and review panel for all safety, security and emergency preparedness concerns and in alignment with University’s Strategic Plan and Goals.  The mission of the Health and Safety Committee is to address work-related health and safety concerns stemming from working conditions.

The responsibilities of the SSU Campus Safety Committee include, but are not limited to the following:

  • Review reports or instances of accidents, incident or property damage for corrective actions that will facilitate a safe working environment. The corrective actions will be tracked in a log to ensure implementation/completion.
  • Review reports of safety concerns in the working/educational environments and collaborate as a committee to implement recommendations.  The Department of Environmental Health & Safety will be responsible to investigate and implement corrective measures.
  • Support and promote efforts by SSU to create a safe work and learning environment.
  • Review, revise and recommend safety policies to support a safe and healthful working and educational environment.  Those policies should be presented to the University Cabinet.
  • Review Security concerns and recommend actions as appropriate related to SSU and discuss prevention methodologies.
  • Review Emergency Preparedness concerns and recommend actions as appropriate.

Membership (Structure)

  • Director of Environmental Health and Safety
  • Associate Vice President for Risk Management and Safety Service
  • Manager of Emergency Services and Business Continuity
  • EH&S Analysts, Environmental Health & Safety
  • Clery Director
  • Chief of Police, University Police Department
  • Director, Employee and Labor Relations
  • The Workers Compensation Program Coordinator or designee
  • One representative of the Division of Student Affairs
  • One representative of Disability Services for Students
  • One representative appointed by Associated Students
  • One representative from Facilities Management
  • One faculty representative appointed by the California Faculty Association labor union (Unit 3)
  • One representative appointed by the Teamsters labor union (Unit 6)
  • One representative of the Academic Professionals of California labor union (Unit 4)
  • One representative from each represented bargaining unit appointed by California State University Employees Union (Units 2, 5, 7. 9)
  • One representative appointed by the State University Police Association (Unit 8)
  • One representative appointed by the California Federation of the Union of American Physicians and Dentists (Unit 1)

Meetings

  • The SSU Campus Safety Committee will meet monthly. 
  • Invitations to meetings will be sent out to all committee members, with details provided in the Agenda, along with any supplementary information.  The primary form of communication will be electronic (email and attachments).
  • The SSU Campus Safety Committee will strive for a consensus when making decisions.  In a case where reaching a consensus becomes a challenge, a small sub-committee will be formed to discuss both sides of the issue and the best resolution for the campus community.

Meeting Effectiveness

Goals and objectives as appropriate for the calendar year will be formulated at the first regular meeting.When setting goals, we should be considering the following of each meeting:

  • What quality improvement activities did we address at the meeting?
  • What processes are we improving on in our discussion/decision?
  • What data did we use in making our decisions?

Membership updated November 2023