EDITORIAL – TRU president on wrong track in restricting meeting agendas

An editorial by Mel Rothenburger.

THOMPSON RIVERS UNIVERSITY is in the news this week, on the one hand for releasing new information and, on the other, for restricting it.

Just as the full report into an investigation of allegations against two senior administrators was posted for public reading, the university came under the spotlight for changes to how meeting agendas are released.

The agendas issue was brought to light in a Castanet story published today (Tuesday, March 26, 2024). Reporter Tim Petruk spends several paragraphs praising his employer for its fine reporting work on TRU before he gets to the point but kudos to Castanet for focusing on what’s going on at the university.

According to the article, president Brett Fairbairn told a meeting of the TRU senate Monday that the old practice of publishing agendas and supporting attachments a week in advance is gone. Now, basic agendas will still be available a week ahead of time but the attachments will be made public only three hours before meeting time. The same will apply to the university’s board of governors.

Fairbairn, as quoted in Petruk’s story, justifies this absurd decision by complaining about
“disrespectful” news coverage, especially of his president’s reports.

“If I were looking to write a media release, I would write a media release,” he says in the article. “Those reports are for you as senators.”

He even mused about quitting his reports altogether. “It certainly would make it easier for me if I didn’t have to worry what the media would think about my comments” in those reports, he said.

This concern about when the media have access to agenda items isn’t brand new. While City council releases its agendas and all attachments and reports the Friday before the following week’s meeting, it used to do so earlier. Fretting within City Hall about the media being able to write about those reports several days ahead of time resulted in putting the release of council agendas off until Fridays.

For the life of me, I can’t figure out why local public bodies have an issue with the timing of the release of their full agendas. They spend a heap of public money. Reporting on what’s coming up on agendas ahead of time lends to more public understanding — if the TRU senate and board members receive feedback ahead of the actual meeting, that’s a positive thing.

The issue seems to be that senators and governors aren’t the first ones to be able to talk about the reports. So what?

Fairbairn wants more control of the agenda, so to speak. He seems to believe that tightening his grip on when the public is allowed to find out what TRU’s board and senate will be talking about will somehow be better than timely transparency.

He’s very badly mistaken.

Mel Rothenburger is a regular contributor to CFJC Today, publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, and is a recipient of the Jack Webster Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award. He has served as mayor of Kamloops, school board chair and TNRD director, and is a retired daily newspaper editor.  He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.