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Newsbriefs
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Accounts Payable office to add unit to solve customer problems

    The university-wide Accounts Payable Department will
reorganize its division of responsibilities. On Nov. 15, the
department will no longer be organized by vendor, but will divide
coded invoices by divison.
    Accounts payable manager Maxine Given said one significant
change will be the addition of a separate Customer Service Unit
on Dec. 1. 
    "This service will provide a place where staff can call to
get prompt help with special needs, such as speeding up employee
reimbursements for things like travel and entertainment expenses
and cutting emergency checks," Given said. 
    The new unit may be reached at 516-6688. Details of the
changes will appear in next month's issue of the Administrative
Bulletin. 


Alumnus could help university save millions with energy audit 

    The annual cost of electricity on the Homewood campus is $5
million; another $1 million is spent on heating oil. Now with the
aid of an environmental engineering alumnus and a student
organization, the university may reap some significant energy
savings.
    On Friday, Nov. 4, Peregrine "Pepper" White Jr., a 1979
graduate of Hopkins who owns LCI Energy, a Massachusetts-based
consulting firm, will donate his services and train members of
Students for Environmental Action on how to conduct an energy
efficiency audit. Following the morning training session, groups
of SEA members will visit 10 or more buildings on campus,
identifying inefficient uses of energy and looking for ways to
improve them.
    The audit sprang from a meeting White had in April with
Charles ReVelle, professor of geography and environmental
engineering, while on campus for his 15-year reunion. At about
the same time, junior mechanical engineering major Eric Lee,
president of Hopkins' SEA, was attending a Campus Earth Summit
meeting at Yale University, where energy audits were discussed.
    "I wanted our club this year to do more to reduce energy
consumption at Hopkins," Lee said. "Dr. ReVelle, who is our
adviser, thought [White] might be able to help us. I wrote him a
letter, and he agreed to donate a day of his time."
    Robert Schuerholz, executive director of facilities
management for all Hopkins campuses, welcomes the opportunity to
continue his commitment to energy conservation.
    "This audit will be a good way for students to learn, and
provide some motivation for our operations staff," Schuerholz
said. "If everybody responds to their suggestions, we could drop
our utilities bill a couple of percent."
    Schuerholz said the Homewood campus has saved about $40
million since 1973, due to such energy conservation methods as
installing heat recovery devices on boilers and utilizing a
computerized energy management system to reduce consumption
during peak hours. A $3.4 million chiller plant--which will make
and melt ice for air conditioning use--being built at Homewood
should save the university $400,000 annually in electricity use.
    Lee hopes ideas and suggestions culled from the audit will
be similarly successful, both financially and in raising the
environmental consciousness of students, faculty and staff.
    "This is exciting for me," Lee said. "We have been
pleasantly surprised by the enthusiasm on campus."


Robert L. Herbert to give Rosen Memorial Lecture 

    Robert L. Herbert, chairman of the fine arts department at
Mount Holyoke College, will deliver the annual Israel Rosen
Memorial Lecture, which is cosponsored by the History of Art
Department and the Baltimore Museum of Art. The talk will take
place at 2 p.m. on Sunday, Nov. 6, at the Baltimore Museum of Art
on Art Museum Drive. BMA admission is free to those who attend
the Rosen Memorial Lecture. 
    Dr. Herbert, who is a specialist in Barbizon, impressionist
and neo-impressionist art, will speak on revealing parallels in
the art and lives of Fernand L�ger and El Lissitzky. Both artists
rose to prominence after World War I, favoring geometric and
architectural forms in painting. In the 1920s, they shared an
interest in the machine aesthetic, and both engaged in art of
public scale. The Israel Rosen lecture is named for the late
Hopkins alumnus and Baltimore physician who was a major collector
of modern art and art books.
    Over the years, Dr. Rosen donated many of his books to the
Milton S. Eisenhower Library, including rare material on cubism,
abstract expressionism, constructivism and futurism. About 1,400
titles comprise the Israel Rosen Collection housed in the
library's Special Collections Department. 
    For information, call the BMA at 396-7100.


Public Health faculty strive to meet challenge of fair health
cost payments 

    One of the stumbling blocks in the health care reform effort
is how to compensate fairly HMOs and managed care providers who
typically receive the same third-party payment per patient
whether the patient is being treated for a cold or diabetes. 
    In an effort to bring more equity to this system, the U.S.
Health Care Financing Administration has awarded the School of
Hygiene and Public Health two contracts, totaling $1.7 million,
to further develop state-of-the-art "risk-adjustment" systems.
The federally funded study will be directed by Gerald Anderson,
director of the Hopkins Center for Hospital Finance and
Management, and Jonathan Weiner,  associate professor in the
Department of Health Policy and Management. 
    Basing their work on two existing plans, they will develop a
better way to balance inequities in the existing system without
government intervention and regulation.
    "With or without national health care reform, an improved
system for risk adjustment will be essential if specialized
medical centers such as Hopkins hope to participate effectively
in HMOs and other managed care networks," Dr. Weiner said.