RESADM-ers:

Some years ago, my institution took on a local scientist who had an NIH grant in hand and needed an institutional home.  We overhauled a lab for him, put him and a couple of additional researchers on the payroll (using grant funds, of course), bought and installed some equipment and let him do his thing.  He brought in a lot of his own stuff as well, much of it scavenged from elsewhere.

The project ended after five years--got some interesting results but no additional funding--and he went away.  But not completely.  He left behind all sorts of papers, equipment, and junk, some of which we finally pitched.  Now he's unhappy about the way we disposed of his stuff and is threatening to sue.  We'll work through this, but I've been wondering how we could have avoided the mess.

So my question is, does anyone have a policy which governs such ad hoc relationships for adjunct researchers?  (I suppose if you have a policy then such relationships are no longer ad hoc at your institution.  They are ad hoc for us, though, that's part of our difficulty.)  Some boilerplate for an agreement, perhaps?  I understand that no agreement can ever handle every possible eventuality--who would have predicted that this guy would steal equipment from elsewhere, leave it behind, and then complain when we dispose of it?  Still, if we had something, a framework at least, on paper going into the relationship it would be easier to sever when it sours.

Thanks and regards, Bill

Bill Campbell
Director, Grants & Research
University of Wisconsin-River Falls

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