A University of Florida task force’s recommendations on when faculty members can serve as expert witnesses in lawsuits that involve the state failed to satisfy professors who are suing the school over its conflict-of-interest policies.
The panel, which was appointed by university President W. Kent Fuchs, released its conclusions on Nov. 23, expressing the need for “a strong presumption that the university will approve faculty or staff requests to testify as expert witnesses, in their capacities as private citizens, in all litigation in which the state of Florida is a party.”
The six professors now suing the university in federal court were initially denied requests to play a part in lawsuits that challenged either a new law on voting rights or coronavirus public health orders.
“This presumption is particularly important in cases that challenge the constitutionality, legality or application of Florida law,” the task force’s report says. It adds that faculty can only be denied such a request when “clear and convincing evidence establishes that such testimony would conflict with an important and particularized interest of the university.”
The attorneys representing the six professors in their lawsuit in the Northern District of Florida, David O’Neil and Paul Donnelly, said they were disappointed in the panel’s recommendations.
“The proposed changes address only the narrow issue of expert testimony, and even on that limited topic, they fail to cure the constitutional problem with the university’s conflict-of-interest policy,” O’Neil and Donnelly said in a statement emailed to the Florida Record. “That policy still allows the university to restrain the faculty’s free speech based on impermissible reasons and in the university’s discretion. We will continue to press the university to make the real change that the Constitution requires.”
The faculty members suing the university are political science and law professors, as well as a medical professor. They are challenging the school’s conflict-of-interest policies as violations of their freedom of expression and rights to academic freedom.
The panel also denied that outside entities or the university’s governing board were involved in the past decisions denying the professors permission to serve as expert witnesses.
“The decisions that have led to the media reports were all made internally,” the panel’s report states. “The university’s established governing board, the Board of Trustees, was not involved in the decision-making process in any way, and entities and/or individuals outside the university’s established governing system had no effect on the recently reported institutional action.”
Fuchs has approved all the panel’s recommendations and noted that some collective bargaining agreements may need to be changed to reflect the recommendations before they will be implemented.