UNC students kept out of board vote on DEI
Students from UNC-Chapel Hill say they were kept out of the building where the UNC System Board of Governors — a public body — met Wednesday, raising questions about whether the board potentially violated the state’s open meetings law.
The board’s University Governance committee unanimously voted Wednesday afternoon to approve a policy targeting diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, jobs and efforts at all public universities in North Carolina. That committee, along with several other board committees, met throughout the day in a theater at the Alex Ewing Performance Place on the UNC School of the Arts campus in Winston-Salem.
The UNC students who attempted to attend the governance committee’s meeting Wednesday afternoon said they were told by Ed Purchase, the UNC System’s director of university public safety operations, that the meeting room was full and all of the seats available to the public were filled. Purchase did not allow the students to enter any portion of the building where the meeting was held, they said.
North Carolina law states that “any person is entitled to attend” meetings of public bodies, including the Board of Governors and its committees.
UNC System spokesperson Andy Wallace told The N&O on Wednesday that some members of the public were unable to enter the meeting room because of a lack of available seats and because the opensession portion of the meeting, in which the vote on the DEI policy took place, lasted for such a short time. By the time system staff could have made accommodations to let more people in, Wallace said, the meeting had gone into closed session, in which members of the public are not allowed.
Raleigh attorney Mike Tadych said the UNC System’s actions Wednesday in keeping the students out of the meeting seemed “dubious,” but said it was “not black and white” to him whether those actions violated state law. Tadych said public bodies, including the Board of Governors, are required “to take reasonable measures to provide access to public meetings.”
UNC student Samuel Scarborough said he and other members of the Southern Student Action Coalition (SSAC), a progressive student-activist group, and TransparUNCy, a group dedicated to shining a light on political influences on North Carolina higher education, wanted to attend the meeting “to make our voices heard” and “be present in the room” as the vote on the DEI policy took place.
“We were not given this opportunity,” Scarborough said.
Asked by The N&O via email Thursday if the UNC System believed it had followed state law on open meetings by keeping students from entering the building, Wallace replied Friday with this statement: “All UNC Board of Governors committee and full board meetings are livestreamed and available to the public via PBS NC. Chancellors, campus staff, UNC System staff, PBS NC technical staff and the Board itself are present in the room to attend the meetings. Seats are reserved for the media. Any open seats are available to the general public on a first-come, first-served basis.”