A ruling issued last week by Maryland’s highest court demanded all coaches at public Maryland universities who receive contracts from team sponsors must consider their contracts public information.

The ruling comes after the Baltimore Sun newspaper sued the University of Maryland in 2002, demanding information about the pay of head football and basketball coaches Ralph Friedgen and Gary Williams under the state’s open record laws.

The Court of Appeals unanimously held that the coaches’ salary contracts were public records, and it ruled 6-1 against the university disclosure of third-party contracts.

According to an article April 16 in the Baltimore Sun, the ruling, “adds momentum to the nationwide debate, building for years, over the escalating compensation of top college-sports coaches — and the role of big money in college athletics generally.”

Many feel the amount of money coaches receive is understated. Ed Waldman, a business news reporter for the Baltimore Sun who has been covering this topic, said there are other universities that have recently released information about their coaches’ contracts.

“Georgia Tech lost a similar lawsuit,” he said, describing a case in which a judge decided the basketball coach’s shoe contract should be public information. He noted all public universities in Georgia now make this information available to anyone and that other states, such as Indiana, Kansas and Hawaii, have also followed the trend.

According to Waldman, there is an NCAA by-law which states coaches must file any outside sources of income with the universities.

“The question is how much of this information that we (the public) get to know,” he said.

Waldman was unsure whether universities receive a cut from their coaches’ endorsement deals.

“If they do, it’s only in a roundabout way,” he said. “They might have separate sponsorship deals.”

Waldman explained the various parts to the Baltimore Sun’s original lawsuit.

“We were told how much money the coaches made. But we weren’t shown any actual documents,” he said, adding the trial court that is deciding if third-party contracts should be public information must take into account whether the contracts the coaches get come from their association with the university.

Waldman does not believe universities are reluctant to release contract information, because Nike and other manufacturers have received a lot of adverse publicity on many campuses due to accusations of unfair labor practices.

Kip Marvin, UW sports personnel manager, said UW’s contracts are accessible to the public.

“I think it’s all public information,” he said “The university has a contract with Adidas, and we also have a communications group in charge of our TV and radio contracts. Any contracts we have should be available.”

Marvin said to his knowledge, UW coaches don’t have outside contracts.

“It’s not each coach with a company; it’s the companies with the university. Any outside interests the coaches get into, they have to request on what we call an ‘out form,’ which gets shown to the athletic director,” Marvin said.