https://www.politico.com/newsletters/florida-playbook/2024/04/25/the-mouse-meets-the-muffin-00154280
FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — Attorney General Ashley Moody is asking a court to force the Atlantic Coast Conference to turn over media rights contracts that are at the center of an ongoing legal dispute between the ACC and Florida State University.
Moody on Thursday filed a lawsuit in circuit court in Leon County demanding that the conference turn over records that her office first asked for back in January after FSU was snubbed from the college football playoff.
The lawsuit maintains that the records — which involve the ACC’s media contracts with ESPN — are required to be made public under Florida law. Currently, the ACC will only allow schools to inspect the records in person in North Carolina and will not allow anyone to copy them.
FSU has sued the ACC over the media rights deal and fees that would be charged to the school for leaving the conference. The ACC, meanwhile, has sued FSU in North Carolina where the conference is headquartered.
“The ACC is asking a state entity — Florida State University — to potentially pay and lose more than a half a billion dollars but is refusing to produce the documents related to that outrageous price tag,” Moody said in a statement first shared with POLITICO. “We sent a public records request to the ACC in January, but they failed to fully comply. We are taking legal action against the ACC for wrongfully withholding these important public records.”
Back in January the general counsel for the ACC told Moody that the contracts between ESPN and the ACC were not public records and “contain commercially sensitive and proprietary information which, if publicly disclosed, would irreparably harm the Conference’s and ESPN’s ability to negotiate future rights agreements.” Pearlynn Houck also maintained the contracts contained trade secrets that allow them to remain confidential under Florida law.
In 2009 Florida courts ruled that the NCAA had to turn over records connected to an investigation into academic misconduct at FSU. The NCAA had maintained that it was allowed to keep the records confidential. The organization would only allow FSU lawyers to look at the records via a secure internet website.
This may be just the first skirmish between Moody and the ACC. In a letter she sent last week to attorneys general in six other states, Moody said Florida was also considering joining FSU’s appeal of a ruling in the North Carolina case. The judge in that case ruled that FSU had waived its sovereign immunity rights and could be sued in that state because FSU was a member of the ACC.
— Gary Fineout
