View the bill.

Campus emergency plans may soon be unavailable to the public.

Oklahoma Senate Bill 585, introduced by John Ford, R-Bartlesville, would allow “certain public educational institutions to keep campus security plans confidential,” making some records relating to campus emergency response plans relating to acts of “terrorism” completely undisclosed to the public.

Information relating to how students and faculty should respond to an emergency will still be available, but some “highly sensitive information” in how the university plans to respond to the threat will be kept confidential, said Ben Hardcastle, communication director for the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education.

The bill states records that include details for “deterrence or prevention of or protection from an act or threat of an act of terrorism,” may be kept confidential. Also, “records including details for response or remediation after an act of terrorism,” may be withheld.

The Senate passed the bill and the House passed it with amendments. The Senate must approve or deny the amendments by Thursday. If the Senate approves the amendments, the bill will go to Gov. Brad Henry for approval. If the Senate denies the amendments, the bill will go to a conference committee.

The Campus Life and Safety and Security Task Force originally made the recommendation in their 2008 report to Henry, Hardcastle said.

After the 2007 Virginia Tech shootings, Henry charged the task force to review the security plans in state higher education and career technology institutions. The task force releases and annual report that reviews progress of their recommendations.

Ford said he decided to carry the bill that officials from higher education proposed because he thinks it is in the best interest of the students.

“I think it’s important for students at our universities and their parents to feel it’s a safe environment,” he said. “Some information shouldn’t be open to general public because some of those people do want to do some harm.”

But Joey Senat, a Freedom of Information Oklahoma representative, said withholding the information could cause some harm.

If emergency plans are not available for review, there will be no way to determine if the plan is competent, he said.

“This keeps the rest of [us] in the dark about what they would do and whether or not that would be an effective plan,” Senat said.

He said it is unlikely keeping emergency plans from the public would deter someone who wants to cause harm.

“I’m not sure what can be in a plan that someone with ill intent won’t do by just not knowing,” said Senat. “These people that come on campus and commit these horrendous crimes don’t seem to concerned about.”