Tuesday, January 25, 2005

Supporting the Troops--Too Controversal for Oregon?

The President of the University of Oregon President, Dave Frohnmayer, just released this statement regarding "decals on state-owned vehicles":
The University has many alumni, students and staff serving in the military in Iraq and other places. Of course we support them and have great concern for their well being, as we do for all U.S. troops.

Some of you may have followed media coverage over the weekend regarding removal of a decal from a state vehicle at the University of Oregon. Decisions about whether employees may or may not put stickers or magnets on state-owned vehicles have nothing to do with the messages. The fact is state vehicles may not have any personal messages affixed to them.

This distinction between a state vehicle and a personal vehicle is very important. Government vehicles in this state have never been allowed to exhibit items of personal expression. State employees are free to use their personal vehicles for statements of all types on university campuses and elsewhere.

Because the university is a state agency, I cannot make distinctions or allowances on this matter, regardless of the cause or the breadth of its support. Whether the message is "Support Our Troops," "Fund Cancer Research" or "Support Tsunami Relief," employees may not place personal stickers or magnets on state-owned vehicles.

See Oregon Department of Administrative Services, Fleet Administration Operating Policies Section 107103-5:

http://egov.oregon.gov/DAS/PFSS/FLEET/docs/das_policy.pdf.


Dave Frohnmayer
President
University of Oregon
phone: (541) 346-3036
fax: (541) 346-3017
pres@uoregon.edu
The cited regulation does say, "No unauthorized stickers are allowed on [state] owned vehicles." But you'd think a yellow ribbon would be unobjectionable. Anyone with an U. Oregon car need help drafting a request for waiver?

(via reader Ken R.)

More:

Kevin at Wizbang links to a local ABC TV affiliate's report.

2 comments:

Stephen Karlson said...

Would your answer be any different if Norfolk Southern prohibited engineers from applying magnets to the locomotives they were operating? The difficulty with the policy lies in its differential application: service workers may not make statements on their trucks, while faculty may use their office doors for such statements (if Oregon is at all like many other universities.)

@nooil4pacifists said...

I would treat the two cases (magnets vs stickers) identically--the state can prohibit its employees from posting messages but, in the case of yellow ribbons or "support the troops," should waive the policy. I take your point about faculity office doors, but the distinction is that no one could reasonably believe that the "messages" posted on a prof's door are state-sponsored speech. In other words, by custom, faculty doors are not public forums, in (apparent) contrast to state-owned planes, trains and automobiles.