Kansan lawsuit continues: Newspaper says suit should not be dismissed, especially in light of recent Student Senate action

The University Daily Kansan’s lawsuit against Kansas University has taken another step forward. The Kansan filed a memo last week opposing the university’s attempt to get the suit dismissed.

And in its latest filing, submitted April 8 in federal court, the Kansan adds that new Student Senate funding decisions made last month have made the Kansan’s situation even worse and, unless they’re blocked, will continue to do so in the future.

Quick background if you’re not up to speed on this story: In February, the Kansan, current editor in chief Vicky Díaz-Camacho and former editor in chief Katie Kutsko sued KU Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little and vice provost for student affairs Tammara Durham. The Kansan complained that KU Student Senate cut the newspaper’s student fee funding in half for the 2015-2016 school year — from about $90,000 to about $45,000 — based on its content, which violated the student newspaper’s constitutional press freedoms under the First Amendment and forced the newspaper to cut staff. The suit names the two administrators because the chancellor or designee must ultimately sign off on student fee usage decisions made by the Senate. KU responded, arguing that the court should dismiss the suit because the plaintiffs lack standing and the suit lacks merit.

“None of their blame-shifting diminishes the defendants’ role,” the Kansan wrote in its new filing. “This was more than just tacit approval in, or rubber stamping of, a sheet of paper that comes across a state administrator’s desk; this case involves the University’s official budget … In recent years the university administration has unilaterally increased the mandatory student activity fee to fund KU athletics. Defendants had the opportunity to do the same here to avoid a constitutional violation.”

Since the lawsuit was filed, the Senate voted on required student fee allotments for the 2016-2017 school year — including keeping the Kansan’s allotment at $45,000 for the year instead of restoring it to what it was two years ago. (I’ve been checking with KU on this, but at last word the chancellor had yet to formally approve or veto the new fee package.)

The Kansan’s April 8 motion comments on that: “Without intervention … the chilling effect on the Kansan’s newsroom will continue. Since this lawsuit was filed, this threat has moved closer to reality. The Kansan stands to suffer further retaliation because the proposed upcoming budget keeps the Kansan’s funding at only one-half of the previous amount.”

If you’re interested (like, really interested), here’s the full 32-page memo. I’ll keep an eye out for further case developments.

Note that Kutsko currently is employed as an intern for Sunflower Publishing, which, along with the Journal-World, is owned by The World Company.

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• I’m the Journal-World’s KU and higher ed reporter. See all the newspaper’s KU coverage at KUToday.com. Reach me by email at sshepherd@ljworld.com, by phone at 832-7187, on Twitter @saramarieshep or via Facebook at Facebook.com/SaraShepherdNews.