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Opinion Letter No. 06-03
May 9, 2006
Student-Athlete Testing Records
After the Athletic Department of the University
of Hawaii, Manoa withheld records relating to the Athletic Department’s
testing of student-athletes for banned substances, the Honolulu
Advertiser appealed that denial to OIP. Specifically, the Honolulu
Advertiser requested access to records relating to the number
of student-athletes who tested positive and the specific actions
taken by the Athletic Department with respect to those student-athletes.
Although OIP agreed that the student-athletes’
privacy interests protected the identity of the student-athletes,
in this case, because the request specifically did not seek disclosure
of the names of the student-athletes, the question was whether
the requested information would allow the public to reasonably
determine the identity of a student-athlete who had tested positive
for a banned substance.
With respect to the number of positive tests, OIP
decided that the number of positive test results, alone, provided
insufficient information from which somebody could reasonably
identify individual student-athletes who tested positive. OIP
therefore concluded that the UIPA did not support the Athletic
Department’s denial of that information and directed that
the Athletic Department disclose the total number of positive
test results.
The breakdown of the specific sanctions imposed
against the student-athletes who tested positive, however, in
OIP’s opinion, could reasonably allow the public to identify
the student-athletes. OIP reasoned that, based upon the Athletic
Department’s representation that very few student-athletes
received the same sanction as those who tested positive for a
banned substance, all of the student-athletes receiving that sanction
would be stigmatized, a clearly unwarranted invasion of the student-athletes’
privacy interests. OIP determined that the Athletic Department
was allowed to withhold the breakdown of actions taken against
the student-athletes as a result of a positive test.
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