The Free Press Is Suing UMich For Routinely Violating Open Meetings Law

Michigan law requires public officials to hold formal meetings
out in the open and allow citizens to attend. Despite this
requirement, the University of Michigan Board of Regents routinely
conducts its affairs behind close doors, away from public
scrutiny.

It is assumed that the regents and the president actually debate
matters at these secret meetings. At the (sham) public meetings,
the regents almost always vote unanimously in favor or against
whatever proposals are on the table—with little debate—lending
credibility to the charge that the real decisions are being made
elsewhere.

In the last year, the regents voted on 116 public matters, and
only 8 of those times were there any dissenting votes.

The Detroit Free Press has filed a
lawsuit against the university:

According to the lawsuit: “These numbers establish clearly that
the Regents do, in fact, routinely discuss the issues they must
decide, and do routinely make their decisions about the University
of Michigan’s governance, all behind closed doors, out of the
public’s view, without public accountability, and in violation of
OMA and its Constitutional obligations.”

“We don’t believe it’s acceptable that the public is essentially
cut out of these meetings,” said Free Press Editor and Publisher
Paul Anger, “considering the law and the bedrock idea that the
public has a right to understand how such an important public
institution conducts itself.”

U-M spokesman Rick Fitzgerald said Friday afternoon university
officials have not seen a the lawsuit and declined comment.

The regents also held meetings out of state, another violation
of the law:

The Free Press lawsuit also alleges that U-M regents — unlike
any others in the state — violated the Open Meetings Act by holding
sessions in California and New York in January for the past two
school years.

“The Regents’ meetings in New York were pre-planned, quorum,
organized meetings to gather information and deliberate toward
decisions on the future of the University of Michigan,” the lawsuit
argues. “The OMA … requires that, ‘All meetings of a public body
shall be open to the public and shall be held in a place available
to the general public.’

“The Regents’ actions have denied the public the right to be
present during the discussion of matters that are of great
importance to the University of Michigan and to the taxpayers of
the State of Michigan.”

U-M is the only university to hold board meetings out of state,
and Free Press attorney Herschel Fink said that U-M is the most
flagrant violator of the Open Meetings Act.

Earlier this year, Fink told a state House committee that U-M is
a “serial abuser of access laws.”

If administrators want to run their universities in the manner
that corporate boards run companies, perhaps they should wean
themselves off the taxpayer dole first.