Otterbein University student journalists have long struggled to obtain records from their campus police department regarding incidents that occurred on their Westerville campus.
At public universities, obtaining such records would be a non-issue. But Otterbein is a private institution, and officials there claim its police department isn’t subject to the Ohio Public Records Act — which requires entities to make the vast majority of their records available to those who request to see them.
Otterbein is only required by law to release logs that must be kept under the Clery Act, which are often inadequate and incomplete, according to a Society of Professional Journalists news release.
This week, SPJ gave student journalists from campus media outlets Otterbein360.com and T&C Magazine $5,000 to sue the university for full disclosure of its police records.
Good for them. As we’ve written before, we are advocates for an active and free student press, and we believe Otterbein should have made its police department subject to public records law when it was upgraded from a “security force” in 2011.
Open public records don’t just benefit the press and its readers — they benefit anyone who values a set of checks and balances for our government.
If no one is allowed to view a department’s records, what proof is there that they even exist? If no one checked your homework or read your final paper, would you bother to do them?
Making records public would also hold the Otterbein police department accountable. Otherwise, the public must simply trust the department to come forward with relevant information at the appropriate time. And it would be impossible to know for sure if the information was complete and accurate.
One of Otterbein’s defenses for keeping records under wraps is that the department wants to protect victims’ privacy. That argument has some merit, but it also has holes.
It’s always a risk to reveal a victim’s personal information, but it’s a risk that every police department struggles with routinely. Private departments aren’t unique in experiencing this dilemma, and they shouldn’t have a special right to conceal a victim’s information. Besides, any publication following the SPJ Code of Ethics, which states that journalists should seek to “minimize harm” in their reporting, would avoid publishing the name of a victim whose privacy was at stake.
Otterbein journalists’ public records battle has also recently hit the Ohio House Floor. House Bill 429, which was introduced Wednesday, would mandate all private police departments (which is an oxymoronic concept to begin with) to make their records available upon request.
The bill is a step in the right direction, and we’re looking forward to its progression, especially in a state that has repeatedly added exceptions to the open records law.
After all, public documents provide the backbone of public service reporting, and without them, journalists are left with more questions than answers. More importantly, so are their readers.
Editorials represent the majority opinion of The Post’s executive editors.
