Executive Council Comments on Virginia Executive Order

In a letter to Terry McAuliffe, the governor of Virginia, MLA President Margaret W. Ferguson expressed concern over the governor’s recent executive order requiring certain faculty members at state universities to make public detailed statements of their economic interests. While public disclosure of financial interests is “an important tool to prevent corrupt influence by employees with independent budgetary and policy-making authority,” the MLA Executive Council believes that the order will impose intrusive requirements on employees who chair academic departments or direct programs and who “have little discretion over decisions that could lead to the practices the new requirements are designed to prevent.”