Legislative committees have been considering yet another exemption to the state’s public records law — this time to guarantee donors to the University of Vermont (as well as to the Vermont State Colleges and the Vermont Student Assistance Corp.) — that their names won’t be disclosed if they request anonymity.

We think UVM’s request for an exemption is unnecessary.

We think current statutory law, as well as case law from court decisions,  supports nondisclosure. Indeed, UVM, VSC, and VSAC asserted that very claim when the Burlington Free Press requested, and the institutions denied, records of donors’ names. Donors have been offered anonymity for quite some time.

But for UVM, the bottom line is that they want to be able to tell donors that a specific state law protects their anonymity. They don’t want to have to tell donors that UVM will help them with litigation, if needed, to protect their anonymity.

We offered the ACLU’s views to both the Senate Government Operations Committee (where the exemption effort began, as an amendment to House bill H. 331) and to the House Government Operations Committee.

We pointed out that the issue is a classic clash of an individual’s right to privacy (not defined in the state constitution, and poorly defined in state law) and the public’s right to hold government officials accountable through access to public records.

(UVM records — as well as those of VSC and VSAC — are public records because it is a public institution, and thus subject to the state’s public records law.)

We also noted the irony in the committees’ actions. They were about to do exactly what three years ago they decried – the addition of yet another exemption to the state’s public records law.

There are already more than 200 exemptions. With so many exemptions, people question how “open” a government’s records really are.

Further, we noted that the committees will continue to be in the position of being asked to add what very well might be unnecessary exemptions as long as an individual’s right to privacy is poorly defined in statute.

Both government operations committees (House and Senate) agreed the long list of exemptions needs to be whittled down. The committees said they would invite suggestions how that could be done.

The committees also support an effort to better define an individual right of privacy. This is a major challenge. Privacy –  a core American value — is a touchy, tricky subject.

No matter what happens with the UVM donor anonymity exemption, there’s an opportunity to make some long-term progress around both open records and privacy.

Read a background story in the Burlington Free Press about the UVM donor anonymity issue.

Read a Burlington Free Press editorial against the exemption.