Minutes of the February 9 2002 Meeting of the Fermilab Users' Executive Committee (UEC) Attendees: John Conway(conway@fnal.gov) Robin Erbacher(robine@fnal.gov) Joey Huston(huston@pa.msu.edu) Sally Koutsoliotas(koutslts@bucknell.edu) Rob Plunkett(plunk@fnal.gov) Rick St. Denis(stdenis@fnal.gov) Benn Tannenbaum(benn@physics.ucla.edu) Wendy Taylor{wendyt@fnal.gov) Sherry Towers(smjt@fnal.go) Gordon Watts(gwatts@fnal.gov) Chris White(cwhite@fnal.gov) Nate Goldschmidt (GSA) Heather Ray (GSA) Mike Kirby (GSA) Absent: Larry Nodulman(ljn@fnal.gov) Roger Rusack(rusack@hep.umn.edu) Freya Blekman(GSA) Michel Sorel (GSA) Guests April Burke, Homer Neal (phone), Mark Marin, Herman White, Mike Witherell Benn called the meeting to order at 10 am. PAC Nominations were discussed and 4 names will be submitted to the directorate. Committee Reports: Quality Of Life: Previously, there had been a proposal to disband UFAC (Users Facilities Advisory Committee) due to the lack of interest and changing character of the lab. Sherrie Towers and Mike Kirby are the UEC representatives on this committee (Mike is also a GSA officer). The upcoming need for a pool, and other facilities (and lack of funding) were discussed. Dee Hahn, the current chair of UFAC, had agreed in the end that UFAC did serve a purpose, but to accomplish its task it had to work more closely with the UEC. Users Meeting Committee: DOE and URA have been contacted, and are interested in presenting at the Users' meeting. Initial contacts were thought to have been made with NSF; this will be followed up. John Conway will design the basics for a poster. First meeting scheduled. The date is June 10-11. GSA reported progress on their NLC talks. They will occur middle of March, and the lab has helped out by giving the program a budget. Nigel Lockyer and Dan Amidei are helping to organize. The talks, of course, are aimed at grad students. The GSA is currently exploring video broadcast and archiving options. Outreach: There was some discussion of a potential display at the Museum of Science and Industry (potential title: Northern Illinois Neutrinos). Chris White is leading this effort with IIT. The UEC is trying to understand if it can help the effort. They have had initial discussions with the museum, and are waiting to hear back. The Fermilab Virtual Ask-a-Scientist program debuted on February 2nd with Roger Dixon as the guest scientist and Robin Erbacher the Moderator. It was a web chat session, and 10-14 people joined the discussion. Now that the format is understood, will be attempted again, with better advertising, and perhaps used as an explicit outreach to school class rooms. They are looking for volunteers. As seen in the recent press releases, Ask-a-Scientist has resumed. Peter Garbincus is the contact person -- and they need volunteers. Currently the program occurs at 1pm on Saturdays, right after Saturday morning Physics. Docent tours have also restarted, but they are by appointment only (due to security reasons). Washington Committee (this part of the discussion occurred before April and others arrived): The trip is scheduled for April 24th and 25th. Working with BNL and possibly Cornell in future might increase effectiveness. The UEC decided to adopt the Energy Sciences Coalition funding statement. (Unanimous of all present). The statement can be seen at http://www.aau.edu/sheets/EnergyTP.html. Mike W, April Burke, Herman White, Mark Marin arrived to join us for lunch and lab & Washington discussion. Mike gave a brief state-of-the-lab report. Security: Further discussions are underway with the DOE to more effectively implement security in a lab environment. This is balenced against allowing scientists to go about their work with as little hindrance as possible. The lab is also trying to find way to bring the outreach effort back to the pre-September 11 level. HEPAP Subpanel Report: The final, accepted, report is available on the HEPAP's web site. The details were changed quite a bit. The main recommendations, however, had been previously adopted and were not changed. Changes included the shaping of the P5 committee, near term projects, etc. Most people that had the biggest complaints seem to feel that it had been improved. A special note on the P5: A number of things conspire to make this a necessity. Its implementation will draw on the work done already by the other advisory committees (like the Fermilab PAC. The current model is similar to a repeating HEPAP subpanel. BTeV will get a P5 review as soon as the panel is constituted). There was more HEPAP news having to do with the NLC: Two groups are going to be organized. First, the obvious Linear Collider Steering Group (R&D, physics, detector, international community). Three lab directors should be on that steering group. Chair not known yet. Second group: Communication group for US Particle Physics (everything). Judy Jackson, Neal Calder (SLAC) will be on the communication committee (April will be a consultant there). Herman White will also be a member of this group. Federal Budget for Office of Science (OOS), HEP, and Fermilab: http://www.aaas.org/ web site is very useful. Unfortunately, the downward trend continues in the president's budget request. NSF did ok. Though univseristy NSF HEP physics hasn't been benefiting much from NSF's increases, though particular physics programs in the physics division have (the frontier centers, for example). In fact, physical sciences in general has not benifited as much as one might wish. DOE's Office of Science (OOS) HEP programs go up only 1%. The budget structure, however, will mean there will be fairly strong downward pressure on that number during congressional negotiations. In HEP, Fermi +1.4%, BNL -25% (AGS termination). LHC is +22.5% (expected). University research is +2.4%. On the NLC: a lot of university groups want to participate in accelerator R&D. A NSF proposal is in preparation (Maury Tigner). All of physical sciences are starved. Keep in mind (!) this is just the president's request and can be modified by congress. State of the TeV: Luminosity is still too low, though the duty cycle is much improved (though problems remain, like step 13, for example). Mike Church is now specifically charged with getting the luminosity up, and is putting together a detailed plan. Once this plan is understood, the lab will allocate resources as required. April and Mark of Burke & Associates joined the conversation to discuss the Washington trip. They are a lobbying firm hired by the URA. In general it was felt that a new approach was required. While most people on the hill agree that science is a good thing, the funding keeps getting cut. Joey: Easter recess ends April 8th. Web site is setup (http://www.pa.msu.edu/~huston/uec/public_html). Preliminary assignments are in preparation. The current schedule has everyone arriving on Tuesday afternoon/evening, a URA meeting from 9-12 at URA headquarters on Wedsnday morning (meet with Bernthall, Heitowitz, Eisenstein, and Goldberg/Whitmore). The rest of the time will be open for congressional appointments (1pm on). There will be a dinner on Wednesday evening with DOE and NSF guests. Thursday all day is open for appointments. Friday there will be a summary meeting with the DOE. We will be concentrating our efforts on the funding committees, our home representitives, and international relations committees. Other Useful tidbits. The Hart-Rudman report notes that we are riding on investments of the last 30 years. This budget is also about the executive Branch attempting to take back control over what is spent (the preamble harkens back to the Nixon era). This administration isn't very high on science, so it isn't surprising that we didn't do so well in this round. The wait to get into a building can be as long as 30 minutes due to security. The tunnel between the house and the senate is no longer open, so each change will involve a security check. We will have practice sessions with role playing again. Herman mentioned that is useful to be as early as you can to the meetings; you never know who you will encounter while waiting for your appointment. Useful URLs for background: information: http://www.nap.edu/catalog/10118.html?se_side (10 year physics study). http://www.nap.edu/catalog/6045.html?se_side -- a HEP study that was used in the first report. Tentatively, April 13th for the April UEC meeting (next meeting is March 9th).