Idaho Sup. Court rules closed-door meetings involving U of I’s dealings with University of Phoenix were not legal

The 18-month legal battle revolved around the early days of the U of I’s Phoenix advertising.

The State Board held three closed board meetings beginning in March 2023 to discuss a possible purchase of Phoenix. The third closed session was held on May 15, 2023 – just three days before the State Board held a hastily announced public meeting and greenlit the Phoenix purchase.

Since June 2024, Labrador has argued that the closed-door discussions violate Idaho’s open meetings law. The case focused on the state board’s rationale for the closed sessions: a section of state law that covers “preliminary negotiations” over a purchase that pits a state agency against “governing bodies in other states or nations.”

Labrador argued that the discussions, particularly the May 15 meeting, were not at all preliminary. The state board and the U of I said negotiations were in flux in the days or even hours before the board’s May 18 vote.

And he has questioned whether the University of Arkansas was competing with other public bidders in its pursuit of Phoenix — particularly after April 25, 2023, when the University of Arkansas Board of Trustees rejected a potential purchase. In a court hearing in January, U of I President C. Scott Green said the U of I was competing with several unnamed public bidders.

While the legal battles have focused on the open meetings law, the case has gained traction. The litigation essentially put financing for the Phoenix purchase on hold and postponed the purchase beyond the parties’ original deadline of May 2024. It was also a high-stakes political showdown between two Republican opponents: Labrador, the state’s elected attorney, and Little, who appoints seven of the state board’s eight members.