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It’s not about the K-9:

3/16/2011: If these people are going to be carrying guns on campus, their qualifications should be in plain view.

So 6 weeks ago I asked for the cover letters and resumes for UO’s current Public Safety Director and his two predecessors. Denied. It took more than a month, and a petition to the DOJ to make UO fork them over. Not unexpected, given that it took two weeks and a petition to make our public records office Liz Denecke and Lariviere’s new general counsel Randy Geller give up their own resumes.

On this petition, the DOJ asked me for 3 extensions of the normal week deadline to rule. Then – my guess here – they told UO that they were going to decide against them, and so UO handed over the docs rather than have that on the record. The DOJ will charge UO about $2500 for this obstinance.

How did Ms Denecke rationalize giving up the resumes, after first claiming they were secret?

… The university concluded that, in this instance, that the public interest in maintaining individual rights to privacy would not suffer by disclosure of the requested documents.  In particular, I thought the resumes demonstrated a depth of experience in our DPS directors that was quite impressive. …

Elizabeth Denecke
Office of Public Records
6207 University of Oregon
Eugene, OR 97403-6207
541-346-6823
[email protected]

I have no idea why Ms Denecke thinks her opinion on our DPS hires matters to anyone, but thanks to Attorney General John Kroger you can now read the applications yourself: Richard Turkiewicz, Kevin Williams, Douglas Tripp. The backstory on Frances Dyke and the Turkiewicz and Williams hires, including what the reporters were able to learn about the scandals – expense account abuse and the accidental shooting death of a campus police officer during an under-age drinking investigation, is here. “Quite impressive?” You decide. And then decide what this all says about transparency at UO.

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