by Kevin Richert
From Idaho EdNews
On Feb. 7, mathematics education professor Michele Carney filed a public records request with Boise State University — seeking emails, meeting notes and a variety of investigative documents.
By April 30, she had lost patience with her employer. She said Boise State was blowing past legal deadlines and blowing off her emails. She asserted a right to records directly pertaining to her — and said Boise State wrongfully withheld them, citing a legal exemption covering personnel records.
So Carney took Boise State to court.
Boise State denied wrongdoing. The university’s lawyer accused Carney of fishing for fodder for “a potential lawsuit against BSU.” The university ultimately turned over 1,289 pages of documents — months after a deadline that is spelled out in state law.
On Sept. 10, Ada County District Judge Jason Scott tossed out the remaining remnants of Carney’s complaint. By this time, the state’s largest taxpayer-funded university had run up $44,833.69 in legal bills.
The dispute between Carney and Boise State offers a glimpse into the intricacies of Idaho’s public records law — a sunshine statute used often by journalists, but not exclusively by journalists. And it illustrates what happens, occasionally, when a public records disagreement lands in a courtroom.
How we got the story — and what it cost
This story is based largely on court documents.
Mathematics education professor Michele Carney filed a petition in Ada County District Court on April 30, seeking to compel Boise State University to complete a public records request dating back to February. The court documents outline Carney’s case and Boise State’s counterarguments — and provide limited details about a Title IX investigation involving Carney.
Carney declined an interview request. Boise State provided a brief written statement.
Idaho Education News filed its own public records request for this story, seeking invoices from Hawley Troxell, the private law firm that represented Boise State.
On Oct. 23, Boise State billed EdNews $11.97 “to identify, gather, review, and, if required, redact” the invoices. (State law allows — but does not require — agencies to bill for public records, if it takes more than two hours of staff time to fulfill a request.)
EdNews paid the $11.97.
On Nov. 3, Boise State provided eight pages of unredacted invoices, outlining $44,833.69 in legal costs.
This isn’t the first time Boise State has demanded money for public records. In 2022, Boise State told EdNews to pay nearly $700 for emails pertaining to political science professor Scott Yenor, before walking back the request.
A short course in Idaho’s public records law
Passed in 1990, Idaho’s public records law was written with the premise of putting the power in the hands of the people, and putting the onus on the government.
“Every person has a right to examine and take a copy of any public record of this state, and there is a presumption that all public records in Idaho are open at all reasonable times for inspection except as otherwise expressly provided by statute,” the law reads.
The dispute between Carney and Boise State centers on exceptions to the law.
The public records law itself doesn’t protect attorney-client communications — but that privilege is established elsewhere in Idaho Code. A sweeping exemption in public records law covers “personnel records of a current or former public official.”
The law contains an exemption to this exemption. “A person may inspect and copy the records of a public agency pertaining to that person, even if the record is otherwise exempt from public disclosure.” This isn’t an absolute right, according to a public records handbook from Attorney General Raúl Labrador’s office. For example, investigatory records remain exempt from release.
The public records law also puts public agencies on the clock. Agencies must grant or reject a request within three working days. The law allows a brief time extension, but agencies still must release records within 10 working days (or 35 days, if a request comes from out of state).
How a records request evolved into a court case
The clock started ticking, and the back-and-forth began, when Carney filed her initial request on Feb. 7. She was focused on “TIXIE” — the university’s Office of Title IX and Institutional Equity. She sought records on disciplinary actions under Title IX, the federal law that prohibits campus discrimination based on sex.
Much of Carney’s request focused on Carney herself — materials, notes and emails, searchable by her name and variations of it.
From the start, and by all accounts, the process was laborious and contentious.
Boise State responded to Carney’s request on Feb. 24 or Feb. 25 — the parties disagree slightly on timing. Either way, the response came after the initial 10-day deadline. Boise State provided Carney 83 pages of documents, and said additional documents were exempt personnel records.
Carney filed a second request on March 4. Boise State denied this request on March 18, again citing the personnel exemption.
Carney pushed back, saying the personnel exemptions should not apply to “records about herself.”
The disagreement deepened through the month of April. Carney said she emailed Boise State repeatedly, asking for updates, and received no response. An attorney for Boise State would later say Carney was “requesting the status of records that were already denied.”
On April 30, Carney filed her petition in Ada County district court, demanding the records under dispute.
“(Carney) has made repeated good faith efforts to narrow the scope, prioritize review, and clarify the nature of the requested records,” the petition read, in part. “(She) has exhausted all reasonable administrative options and communications to resolve this matter informally.”
Going to court was Carney’s sole option. It is the only recourse state law allows. Here, the onus falls on the requester of a record — be it a private citizen or a news organization.
And that, say some, is a shortcoming in the law.
The Mountain States Policy Center — a free-market think tank — has advocated for creating a public records ombudsman’s office in Idaho and other Northwest states.
“This type of citizen-focused open government expert would help reduce the possibility of litigation when a public records dispute occurs,” Jason Mercier, the center’s vice president and research director, wrote in March 2024.
An ombudsman could have settled this dispute quickly and inexpensively, either in Carney’s favor or in Boise State’s favor, said Melissa Davlin, host of Idaho Public Television’s “Idaho Reports,” and president of the Idaho Press Club.
“This could have been resolved months ago,” she said.
The Idaho Legislature hasn’t formally considered creating an ombudsman’s office, but Davlin said the Press Club is working on a bill for the 2026 session.
Both sides lawyer up — and Boise State does so at public expense
Carney and Boise State spent the summer embroiled in a lengthy legal skirmish.
By June, Boise State had hired Hawley Troxell — a prominent Boise-based firm with extensive experience in education law.
By mid-August, both parties had lawyered up. In dueling documents, attorneys appealed to Scott, seeking summary judgment on their client’s behalf.
At this point, Carney had received an additional 1,289 pages of records, the document dump from Aug. 4. But Jeffrey Hepworth, Carney’s newly hired attorney, argued that his client requested these records on March 7, meaning Boise State missed its legal deadline by “approximately 136 days.” Hepworth also argued that Boise State had misread the law.
“It appears Boise State University relies upon the exemption provided for ‘personnel records’ … without regard to the fact that the materials requested by Michele Carney all pertain ‘Michele Carney’ herself,” he wrote.
In an Aug. 19 motion, Hawley Troxell attorney Carsten Peterson addressed Boise State’s delays, noting that, under the law, any records request that is not completed within 10 days is deemed to be denied. He said Boise State created a document for Carney, outlining TIXIE’s investigative and enforcement actions against Boise State faculty. And Boise State public records custodian Texie Montoya spent at least 60 hours working with Carney, reviewing more than 3,000 pages of documents.
In the end, he said, Boise State provided records at no cost to Carney.
“There is no dispute that BSU acted in good faith responding to (Carney’s) ever-changing or modified requests,” he wrote. “It complied with the requirements of the statute.”
It’s unclear how much Carney spent to pursue her case. She declined an interview request, and Hepworth did not respond to an interview request from EdNews.
Between July 3 and Oct. 2, Hawley Troxell billed Boise State $44,833.69.
A university spokeswoman defended the cost.
“When a complaint is filed in court, we are obligated to defend it,” Stephany Galbreaith told EdNews in an email. “It is our standard process to retain outside legal counsel for litigated matters. Although public records litigation is rare, the costs incurred to defend this case are typical.”
How the dispute started …
The two sides agree on the genesis of the dispute.
In 2024, an employee came to university officials and raised Title IX-related “concerns” about Carney and other employees, Danielle Berish Charters, Boise State’s assistant vice president for Title IX Institutional Equity and Compliance, said in a statement to the court. In April 2024, Boise State hired legal counsel, Akerman LLP, to investigate the matter.
Akerman prepared a 27-page report in September 2024, and sent it to Charters. In November 2024, Charters met with Carney.
The outcome isn’t clear. However, Carney is still listed as a faculty member on Boise State’s website.
“Because the records request is connected to an ongoing investigation, I need to decline (to comment) at this time,” Carney said in an email to EdNews last week. “I am choosing to trust the investigation process and believe that our almost entirely new (and interim) administrative leadership will act appropriately when it concludes. …
“In the meantime, I will continue focusing on my work supporting Idaho’s teachers and students in improving mathematics education.”
… and how the dispute ended
By late August, the complaint had narrowed down to a small set of documents — including the Akerman report, and the contents of the three-ring binder Charters brought to her November 2024 meeting with Carney.
Carney sought access to both — and one of her attorneys argued that Charters put together the binder specifically for her meeting with Carney. “(They) ‘concern’ or ‘pertain’ to Dr. Carney and her ongoing employment with Boise State University — and therefore should be produced to her,” J. Grady Hepworth wrote in a Sept. 5 filing.
Peterson, Boise State’s attorney, described the binder as a “receptacle” that also contained confidential documents concerning another faculty member. The Akerman report is an exempt personnel record from legal counsel, Boise State argued, and Carney received an “outcome notice” and investigative summary that provided her with the information that pertained to her.
On Sept. 10, the issue went before Scott, the judge assigned to the case. After hearing the dueling motions for summary judgment, Scott sided with Boise State. He said Carney was not entitled to attorney’s fees. According to minutes from the 45-minute hearing, Scott also set aside the question of whether Boise State was entitled to collect attorney’s fees.
With the case now closed, it appears taxpayers will shoulder Boise State’s legal costs. However, it was important that to have the case addressed “in the best interest of the public we serve,” said Galbreaith, the university’s spokeswoman.
“Boise State University takes its responsibility to uphold the integrity and reputation of the institution seriously.”
From Idaho EdNews