The College of Charleston recently had our first case of a PI moving to
another institution.  He had an expired NSF grant.  Our check of the regs
indicated that that equipment bought on this grant belonged to the
institution and we could do with it as we saw fit.  Since other PIs did not
use the equipment, we eventually allowed him to take it.  The NSF program
officer I talked with liked this idea because it helped him continue his
overall research program at his new institution.

The same investigator also had a current subcontract from another
institution, again funded by NSF.  There were no "co-owners" of the
equipment.  In this case, the regs were quite clear that the equipment went
with him.  I'm not sure what we would have done had we kicked in matching
funds--perhaps negotiate with his new institution to buy out our share
(depreciated value, of course).

If you're in a public institution, don't forget to check your state
property management regs.  These gave us some surprises.  SC law says that
equipment owned by our institution (i.e., that purchased on expired grants)
cannot be given away (i.e., transferred to the PI's new--and probably
out-of-state institution) unless it has first been offered to other persons
in our institution and then, if they don't want it, offered to persons in
all other state universities and agencies.  We had to get special
permission to allow the equipment from the expired grant go with our PI.
Seems state property management guidelines, at least in SC, are problematic
for university research.

Barbara H. Gray                                       xxxxxx@cofc.edu
Director of Sponsored Programs                        Phone:  (803) 953-5673
University of Charleston, SC                          FAX:    (803) 953-1434
66 George Street
Charleston, SC 29424-0001