Cal Poly settles lawsuit with student reporter over public records requests
Cal Poly agreed to a settlement in a lawsuit filed by Cal Poly student and Mustang News journalist over a complaint that the university violated the California Public Records Act.
Elizabeth Wilson was represented by the First Amendment Coalition. She was previously an intern for The Tribune.
“I’m so pleased Cal Poly has agreed to a settlement, but it shouldn’t have required a lawsuit to assert my — and the Cal Poly community’s — right to this information,” Wilson said in a news release Friday. “Access to records isn’t just important to journalists like myself. It’s important to anyone who seeks to hold institutions accountable.”
According to the news release, Wilson filed three public records requests with the university in 2022. The requested records pertained to sexual assault and harassment on campus, as well as labor violations alleged by Cal Poly student employees.
California law requires public institutions to provide an estimated date for when a public records request will be fulfilled, which the university did not comply with, according to Wilson’s claim. According to the release, Wilson received the records in July — around two months after she filed the lawsuit, and over a year after she submitted the original request.
The records released included 236 emails, according to the news release. Another 21 emails were withheld due to exemptions.
Cal Poly’s settlement requires the university to organize a training within the next three months for all staff who process public records requests, according to the release. It also gives Cal Poly’s student journalists the opportunity to meet in person with university records technicians to discuss the status of unfulfilled public records requests.
“Access to public records is the people’s constitutional right,” Annie Cappetta, legal fellow at the First Amendment Coalition, said in the news release. “It’s not a favor that officials can facilitate when it’s convenient for them and ignore when it’s not. This settlement will remind Cal Poly staff of their duties to the public and ensure that they come to the table to improve their process with students.”
Cal Poly confirmed to The Tribune that the university reached a settlement but could not offer further comment.
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