A legal challenge questions Pitt police’s exemption from right-to-know laws

A Common Pleas judge is considering arguments to see if the public should have access to the University of Pittsburgh Police Department’s inner workings under the state’s Right-to-Know Law .  Henry Bard, a freelance reporter and Pitt student, made a public records request in April 2025 to the school’s police force for a wide range of topics, including information about a provider of “less lethal” firearms and enforcement operations at pro-Palestinian rallies between 2020 and 2025. The school denied Bard’s request for these files, and the state’s agency for right-to-know laws — the Office of Open Records — supported the rejection by citing the school’s special designation under state law. Bard appealed the decision to the state’s court, and Judge Daniel D. Regan heard arguments from Bard’s lawyer, Paula Knudsen Burke, and counterarguments from Pitt’s lawyer, Jeremy Engel. Regan is now left to make a decision on proceeding with this case or dismissing it. In considering a record’s request made to the school, the court has the chance to address a gray zone regarding public oversight being applied to the school’s police the same the way a normal police department would be. Burke argues in court filings that the open records office didn’t perform a “proper analysis” and, if it had, it would have found Pitt’s police department “is properly characterized as a local agency” (emphasis added).  The “real” police As a state-related institution, Pitt operates under separate state laws. On Wednesday, Engel cited the separate right-to-know law, saying the school operates under Chapter 15 , not Chapter 3 like other public institutions and agencies. In court filings, Pitt’s legal team admits that Bard’s request “potentially requires disclosure of those types of records from Commonwealth, legislative, judicial, and local agencies” but, because the school operates under the Chapter 15 designation, it “plainly does not require disclosure of these