NEW YORK — In a case that may prove helpful to studentsaffected by rising college costs, a state supreme court judgeordered a community college’s bookstore to give its invoices tothe student newspaper in November.
The order came after a former student newspaper editor suedthe Hudson Valley Community College Faculty Student Associationfor access to bookstore records. The FSA, a nonprofit group thatruns the bookstore and other campus services, issued the invoices,in redacted form, to the student newspaper, The Hudsonian,shortly after the ruling.
Information not blacked out included the title of the book,the price the bookstore paid before any volume discounts weretaken and the date the books were purchased. Editors from TheHudsonian then compared these prices with student receiptsfor the books from the same time period and found the averagemarkup to be about 30 percent.
Because the price listed on the invoices was what the bookstorewould have paid if it had purchased only one book, it is not clearexactly how much the bookstore paid for the books, nor what theactual markup was.
At the beginning of the spring 2000 semester, Ellen Evans,The Hudsonian news editor, asked for all the invoices thebookstore had on file for that semester. She was told she couldexamine some of the invoices on the condition that she not photocopythem or use them as the basis for a news story.
Tony Gray, then the paper’s editor-in-chief, filed a statefreedom of information law request for the invoices, which theFSA denied. He then sued the FSA for the invoices. Judge GeorgeCeresia, Jr. ruled he was "unable to discern any substantialcompetitive disadvantage arising by reason of mere disclosureof the identity of the books and each book’s unit price."
Although Ceresia denied Gray’s request that the FSA pay hisattorney fees, Gray’s lawyer represented him on a reduced-feebasis.
Gray said the volume discounts were readable on some of theinvoices and the markup rate was as high as 50 to 90 percent.
Michael Baker, current editor of The Hudsonian, saidstudents responded negatively after the paper published a storyrevealing the bookstore’s pricing policies.
"The students I talked to [about the markups] weren’tsurprised at all, but they were quite mad," he said.
Ann Carrozza, executive director of the FSA, said the bookstore’saverage markup is close to 30 percent, which is less than theindustry standard of 33 percent, and that there is a price-matchingpolicy in place for students. The FSA had based much of its defenseon the claim that the invoices were proprietary information andthus protected the same way trade secrets are.
The recent publicity surrounding the bookstore’s prices hasnot hurt sales, according to Carrozza.
"I don’t see that occurring to any large measure,"she said. "If we lower our markup one or two percent, studentswould still say books are too expensive, because [in general]they are too expensive."
If the newspaper staff requests invoices in the future, Carrozzasaid she "doesn’t know what the response will be [from theFSA]."
Previous Stories:
Formernewspaper editor sues campus agency for access to bookstore records,Fall 2000 Report
Related Stories:
Senatelocks doors to newspaper office in battle over advertisment,Spring 2000 Report
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Previous Stories:
Formernewspaper editor sues campus agency for access to bookstore records,Fall 2000 Report
Related Stories:
Senatelocks doors to newspaper office in battle over advertisment,Spring 2000 Report
Communitycollege newspaper to resume publication after 8-day shutdown(2/18/00)