Public has right to know

More than one year ago, after months of actions and discussions, former men's basketball coach Bob Knight was fired.\nIU President Myles Brand cited Knight's violation of the "zero tolerance" policy as the main reasoning behind the decision to let Knight go. Brand highlighted several different instances of Knight's violating this policy since its institution in May of 2000 when explaining the decision in a press conference. \nSince that day, there has been much debate about what it was exactly that Knight did and whether Brand fired Knight in a legal manner.\nOn Oct. 3, Knight filed an affidavit with the Indiana Court of Appeals disputing many of Brand's comments about his reasoning for firing Knight, as well as bringing up a point that his contract was changed without his knowledge. \nThe most important part of the affidavit, though, was Knight's waiving of his confidentiality rights to his personnel file. This was done in the interest of having the truth come out about the meetings Brand held with the trustees in the days leading up to his firing. Now it's up to the University to release these files to the public, and they should.\nTypically, personnel files are kept confidential, for the reason of protecting information about a person from becoming public knowledge. Yet in this case, Knight is not worried about what may come out, and he himself is curious to hear what exactly went on. \nIn his affidavit, Knight says "I am as interested as anyone in discovering the exact conversations held between Myles Brand and the Trustees of Indiana University, not only on September 8 and 9, 2000, but on March 14, 2000, and any other dates that my employment status may have been discussed."\nThere is also the important issue of freedom of information. Regarding a public university funded by public dollars, the people have a right to know about what goes on behind closed doors and the decisions that are made. There are currently lawsuits pending against the university, claiming that they violated both the Indiana Open Door Laws and Indiana's Access to Public Records Law. Now that Knight has signed off on the confidentiality, the personnel files should be open to the public and up for review. \nThe debate that has raged since the firing is casting a pall over the university and anything that it does. If Brand and the trustees have nothing to hide, then there is no reason for the records to not be released.\n