Martha M. Taylor <xxxxxx@MAIL.AUBURN.EDU> writes:
>
>Has anyone had experience negotiating a cooperative agreement with Wright
>Patterson AFB?  My particular concerns are indemnification.
 [snip]
>I am seeking advice from someone who may have sucessfully negotiated
>deletion of or appropriate modification of these clauses.  Auburn is a
>public IHE and instrumentalitity of the State of Alabama.  Sovereign
>immunity arguments have thus far fallen on deaf ears.

Although we have not had any involvement with W-P at the Health Center,
UCONN has, until relatively recently, also had problems convincing sponsors
about the effectiveness of the doctrine of sovereign immunity.  Hence, we
had the law changed a few years back to give the University the ability to
indemnify sponsors, at our discretion.  The operative words here are
OUR DISCRETION.

It is, "our discretion", to indemnify as few sponsors as we can get away with.
Consequently our current policy is to try as hard as before to negotiate
away indemnification of the sponsor language.  Even with our ability to
indemnify, there are limits, so one tactic, which has been variably
successful, is to try to insert language which states that the indemnification
"will be limited to the extent allowable by state law".

Good luck!

Len

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Leonard P. Paplauskas    Assistant Vice President for Research     |
203-679-3173             University of Connecticut Health Center   |
FAX 679-2670             Farmington, CT   06030-5355               |
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xxxxxx@neuron.uchc.edu                                           |
xxxxxx@sun.uchc.edu                                            |
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