Senate to vote Wednesday on Transparency for Senate Committees

The Meeting is this Wed 4/9/02014, 3-5PM in 115 Lawrence. Agenda here.

Among the important motions for this meeting is one that would require most Senate committees to post their agendas online a week before the meeting, and generally hold open meetings – with plenty of reasonable exceptions for personnel matters, student records, and discussions that involve other confidential matters. The importance of open meetings for UO business was reinforced at the recent meeting of the UO Board of Trustees, where Randy Geller’s efforts to draw up a delegation of authority motion for the board in secret led to way more work for everyone, and way less trust.

This motion has gone through the Committee on Committees and was discussed in detail at the last Senate meeting. The motion and more information is posted at http://senate.uoregon.edu/content/open-committee-meetings There is additional background at the bottom of that page, e.g. an opinion from GC Randy Geller and from another competent attorney with a different interpretation. Both agree that the Senate can do this if it wants, subject of course to laws about releasing student and personnel records. The motion includes provisions covering those exemptions.

I think this motion draws a reasonable balance between openness, confidentiality, and minimizing extra work. I support it and I hope other Senators will too.