settlement<\/a> with the Brandeis Center over allegations of antisemitism, Berkeley Law has adopted a policy stipulating that registered law student organizations cannot have bylaws restricting event speakers.<\/p>\nAs a result, Berkeley Law has designated LSJP as an informal student group. Unlike Registered Student Organizations, ISGs are prohibited from cosponsoring Berkeley Law events, according to the lawsuit.<\/p>\n
However, a third category of organizations \u2014 non-UC Berkeley groups such as the California Law Review \u2014 are still allowed to cosponsor events.<\/p>\n
Powelson alleges Berkeley Law has not made the distinction between ISGs and non-UC Berkeley groups clear.<\/p>\n
\u201cAny organization outside of Berkeley can cosponsor an event unless it\u2019s deemed to be an informal student group, but there\u2019s no criteria or basis for determining who is an informal student group and who is a nonaffiliated organization not affiliated with Berkeley,\u201d Powelson said. \u201cIt seems like there\u2019s a very arbitrary determination that\u2019s being made against a disfavored group.\u201d<\/p>\n
Powelson filed a public records request for Berkeley Law\u2019s new student organization policies and communications related to LSJP and the Brandeis Center settlement. Under the California Public Records Act, agencies have 10 days to determine whether records exist and notify the requesting party of their existence.<\/p>\n
UC Berkeley\u2019s public records office acknowledged Powelson\u2019s request and noted his request \u201clikely does seek disclosable records.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Powelson alleges UC Berkeley still violated the 10-day window of response, on the grounds that saying records \u201clikely\u201d exist is \u201cvery different than saying they do or do not.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBerkeley Law is working with the campus public records office to ensure compliance with the Public Records Act, which takes into account allowing time for both review and the opportunity to work to narrow overly broad requests,\u201d said UC Berkeley spokesperson Dan Mogulof in an email.<\/p>\n
This lawsuit is a part of a new initiative Powelson is launching called the Public Records Enforcement Project, which aims to file public records requests and sue when an agency misses a deadline or withholds records.<\/p>\n
Powelson said he hopes this project, cofounded by Berkeley Homeless Union cofounder and photojournalist Yesica Prado, will increase transparency with public agencies.<\/p>\n
\u201cPublic records, that\u2019s how you have a level anytime you\u2019re dealing with government. Whether it\u2019s in advocacy, litigation, journalism, you always need to look underneath the hood so you have an even playing field with government officials,\u201d Powelson said. \u201cThey have a lot of power, and the way we know how they\u2019re wielding that is through these transparency laws.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UC Berkeley is being sued for allegedly failing to properly communicate the existence of public records concerning the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":506626,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[36596,103423,47078,14760,143,145,144,195788,145694,149,83502,32094,38431],"class_list":["post-506625","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-berkeley-law-students-for-justice-in-palestine","tag-brandeis-center","tag-california-public-records-act","tag-dan-mogulof","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news","tag-public-records-enforcement-project","tag-robbie-powelson","tag-uc-berkeley","tag-uc-berkeley-school-of-law","tag-yesica-prado","tag-zionist"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/506625","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=506625"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/506625\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/506626"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=506625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=506625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=506625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}