Anyone who has tried to get information out of the University of Nebraska knows that we are a reflexively and relentlessly secretive institution. While nominally subject to Nebraska open meetings and freedom of information statutes, the university tries very hard to keep information about certain parts of its operations from the general public.
I first ran into the University’s wall of silence when a couple of my colleagues and I tried to get data on ‘Opportunity Hires‘ — the system of hiring faculty without an open search, which under the administration of former chancellor Moeser became a system of hiring preferences based on race, sex and ethnicity. When we asked for hiring data, we were told that the information had never been collected centrally, and was dispersed over hundreds of files and memos.
But strangely, when we enlisted a member of the State Legislature to help obtain the data we wanted, the university promptly produced a set of detailed spreadsheets, with the ethnicity, race and sex of the candidates, the reason for the hire, etc., nicely laid out.
Another example: About 18 months ago, in collaboration with the Center for Equal Opportunity in Falls Church, Va., I attempted to get information on admissions to UNMC and the Law College, and was again stonewalled. Fortunately, while we were being given the run-around, we discovered that UNL’s Law College had in fact provided the data we were seeking to a researcher studying diversity at law schools.
When CEO released their study on admissions preferences at the Law College, the University’s first response was not to deny the accuracy of the numbers, but to say we could not possibly have obtained the data!
This newspaper, of course, has been the victim of the same secretiveness. I have been told by former DN writers that when the DN tried to use freedom of information requests to follow up on the student lending scandal, the university terminated normal contacts with the DN and instituted a policy of not talking to this newspaper. The university even refused to release information on how many FOIA requests it had received, and how many it had complied with!
I have been told that at the Lincoln Journal Star, they quickly learn a similar lesson. The reporter who covers the university has a symbiotic relationship with it. If they write too many uncomplimentary stories or dig where the university does not want them to dig, they find that the interviews and exclusive stories the university feeds the beat reporters are cut off.
Needless to say, it is completely inappropriate for a public institution to try to restrict the flow of public information in this way. We as private citizens or private organizations have the right not to talk to any particular newspaper — I have in the past refused to talk to the DN because I felt there were ethical issues with its coverage of certain topics.
But the University does not have an equivalent right. Quite the opposite: As a public body, it has a duty of transparency and should limit that transparency only to protect the rights or privacy of individuals, or to otherwise follow the law.
In reality, experience has taught the University to fear transparency. Just one recent example: when the state auditor inquired about the funding of the now-cancelled visit of Bill Ayers, the university was forced to admit that statements it had previously made, to the effect that the visit was to be privately funded, were false.
One would have hoped the Board of Regents — the body the public elects to oversee the university — would insist on such transparency from the University. The Board, unfortunately, has instead tended to show a similar contempt for our right to know.
When I requested in January 2008 that the Board comply with Nebraska open meetings law, I was met with a haughty refusal. Intervention of the Attorney General was needed to get them to comply. The University of Nebraska — its central administration, its campuses and its Board of Regents — all too often acts as if Nebraska open government statutes simply don’t apply to them.
And if the University gets its way this year, the statutes indeed won’t apply. The latest and most egregious attempt to make an end-run around the public’s right to now is currently before the legislature, in the form of LB674, introduced by Danielle Nantkes. Ostensibly, LB674 allows the Regents to set up a position of internal university auditor.
Superficially, this might seem to be a good thing. Our current state auditor has demonstrated a wonderful capacity for keeping government honest. The devil, however, is in the details. The university’s auditor will be internal — an employee — answering to the University and the Board of Regents, not the public. And all materials used by the auditor to compile reports will be exempt from open meetings statutes. In fact, release of any such materials to the public will now become a crime.
It doesn’t take an evil genius to see how this will work.
Say, hypothetically, the University wants to conceal its failure to comply with non-discrimination laws. All it will have to do is make the compilation of reports on hiring a function of the internal auditor’s office, and such reports will longer be obtainable by FOIA requests.
In fact, release of such data by the auditor or anyone working with the auditor will become a criminal act.
Or, say the University wants to conceal how it’s paying for a visit by Osama bin Laden to the Quilt Study Center to give a lecture on afghans (the rugs, not the people!). All it has to do is put the financial details in the hands of the auditor, to be carefully sanitized before release to the people.
The University certainly needs auditing, but it is a ludicrous idea to put such audits under the control of the University or its wholly owned subsidiary, the Board of Regents. The state auditor is a constitutionally elected official with no reason to be loyal to the university, and is therefore independent. Audits should be his responsibility.
Whether you’re from the Left or from the Right; whether you’re student, faculty or just a citizen of Nebraska worried about how your tax dollars are being spent, you need to take action now to kill this insidious piece of legislation and preserve what little transparency there is left in University governance.
Call your state senator! Turn up at the legislative hearing! If LB674 gets through the legislature, ask the Governor to use his veto power! The University already shows considerable talent at pulling the wool over the public’s eyes; let’s not make it any easier for them!
Dr. Gerard Harbison is a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Reach him at opinion@dailynebraskan.com.
It cannot be a gaffe if it was blatantly intentional.
Academic jobs tend not to be 9 to 5 jobs. One day, you could work from 9AM to 10PM, and the next 6AM to 4PM, and so on, depending on project deadlines, meetings, classes taught, and the like. I'm guessing that Dr. Harbison puts in more than 40 hours per week, in the office, at home, and elsewhere, and writes these columns and his blog posts and whatever else on his "own free time." Whatever "own free time" means in this context.Dr. Harbison,
"Or, say the University wants to conceal how it’s paying for a visit by Obama bin Laden to the Quilt Study Center to give a lecture on afghans (the rugs, not the people!)." Obama bin Laden? Really?Anyway, I agree that having an external auditor would be a good idea, but I don't think that preventing an internal one is a good idea. The person may have to answer to the Regents, but that does not automatically mean that the auditor him or herself would be corrupt. Still, an outsider would be good.