Use the law school for free – but pay to see the contracts

Phil owns us. I think this was pretty well proven when Knight took away the law school professors’ parking lot for the jocks to use while they were getting tutored. But just in case there was any doubt, a curious law student dug up this:

From: Zach Spier
@uoregon.edu>

Date: July 16, 2012 7:04:00 PM PDT

To: School List
@lists.uoregon.edu>

Cc: Michael Moffitt
@uoregon.edu>

Subject: law-students: Nike use of law school during Olympic Trials

During the Olympic Trial, Nike got the exclusive use of most public areas of the law school for almost two weeks at no charge.*

For those of you who weren’t here, that included the commons, student lounge, Court Cafe, all upstairs classrooms, and all downstairs classrooms except 175 and 110.  Those areas were walled off tightly.  By comparison, BarBri paid $275/day for Room 175 only, which is a substantial discount from our usual rental rates.  I wasn’t able to find out how rental income is split between the law school and the rest of the university,** but I believe we’d have received the lion’s share if Nike had paid to rent our space like any other company would have had to.

There might be a legitimate case to be made for this arrangement, but from my perspective, it doesn’t matter whose name is on our building, or who sponsors our athletic programs.  Nike is a very profitable publicly traded corporation, and its founder’s generous gifts do not give tuition-paying law students an obligation to put money in the pockets of its shareholders.  I think we probably gave up enough money to put a deserving student through school for a year.  I assume that this decision was made by somebody in Johnson Hall, and I hope our Dean did everything he could to get something out of the deal for us.  

I’m sure others will argue we should just be happy Knight didn’t want to use the law school for a day care center.

Regular rates for renting law school classrooms are here. The full special no charge Nike contract is here – big file. Earlier Oregonian story here. And while UO was happy to let Nike (or the OTC – anyone know the difference?) use the building free, they were a bit more concerned about letting a UO student see the deal without forking over some more of his student loan money:

Dear Mr. Spier:

The University of Oregon, Office of Public Records has received your public records request for:

“(i) The contract for Nike’s rental of the law school and adjacent areas during the Olympic Trials.
(ii) The contract for BarBri’s rental of law school classroom space for the summer session.
(iii) The written policy or procedure for renting out law school space to private entities, including
(a) The current written cost schedule (i.e. how much per room per day)
(b) The current written policy for determining rental fees in absence of a cost schedule, or for unique requests like Nike’s
(c) The current written policy for dividing rental revenue between the law school and other general university funds”
The office is now providing an estimate to respond to your request.

The office estimates the actual cost of responding to your request to be $511.61. Upon receipt of a check made payable to the University of Oregon in the amount of $511.61, the office will proceed to locate, copy, and provide the records you have requested that are not exempt from disclosure. Your check may be sent to the attention of Office of Public Records, 6207 University of Oregon, Eugene, OR 97403-6207.

The university has received your request for a fee waiver for these records. The decision to waive or reduce fees is discretionary with the public body. After considering your request, the possible public interest in these particular records, and the length of time required producing and redacting these records, the office does not consider that the totality of the circumstances presented in this instance meets the standard for a fee waiver.

Should you be interested in lowering the cost of your request, I would suggest eliminating subsection c in item 3, as it comprises the bulk of the estimate.
Please note that if the cost of preparing the documents for you is less than the estimate, we will refund the difference. If the cost of preparing the records for you exceeds the estimate, however, you may be charged for the difference. Following is an outline of how costs are determined.

The office charges a copy fee of 25 cents per page. The office also charges for the actual cost of making public records available. The charge includes, but is not limited to, staff costs for locating, gathering, summarizing, compiling, reviewing, tailoring or redacting the public records to respond to a request. The charge may also include the cost of time spent by an attorney in reviewing the public records, redacting material from the public records, or segregating the public records into exempt and nonexempt records. If the request is to inspect records, the charge includes the time for records to be prepared for review and the cost of staff time for a staff member to be present while the requester reviews the records to preserve the integrity of the university’s records. If the request is to certify the records as true copies, the charge will include employee time spent in doing so. The charge will also include the cost of sending the records where copies are requested.

The cost of time for each employee is calculated by multiplying the employee’s hourly wage calculation (including benefits expenses) by the hours or portions thereof necessary to locate, gather, summarize, compile, tailor, review, redact, segregate, certify or attend the inspection of the public records requested.
Thank you for contacting the office with your request.

Sincerely,

Lisa
Lisa Thornton
Office of Public Records
University of Oregon
6207 University of Oregon
Eugene, OR 97403-6207
[email protected]

But, after some negotiating, Mr. Spier was able to get most of the documents he wanted for the more justifiable price of $0.00. And in all fairness, acting UO Public Records Officer Lisa Thorton was very helpful with that – despite Interim President Bob Berdahl’s best efforts to make those curious about UO matters pay as dearly as possible. 7/17/2012.

Dear Mr. Spier –

Attached are the records responsive to your request made 06/26/2012. The office considers the attached documents to be a ‘simple request’, and as such are being provided to you at no cost.

The contract between the UO and Oregon Track Club (OTC) for the 2012 Olympic Trials has been redacted for personal privacy (ORS 192.502 (2)). Additionally, you will see that on page 17 of that contract “day 6” has been blacked out. This is part of the contract, and was not done by our office.

The office considers these documents to be fully responsive to your request, and will now close your matter. Thank you for contacting the office with your request.

Sincerely,

Lisa
Lisa Thornton