Streamline UW research, but keep ethical oversight

Wednesday, October 12, 2005 11:04 AM CDT

There's a move afoot over in the Capitol to exempt UW System researchers from an old state law that restricts public employees who start private companies from signing contracts with the university.

Under the law those employees can't sign contracts worth more than $15,000. If they want to exceed that they need an opinion from the state attorney general that the contract would be legal.

Gov. Jim Doyle is on board with the change as are several lawmakers - including state Sen. Ted Kanavas, a Brookfield Republican who chairs a committee on economic development.

"Eliminating this unintended restriction will free researchers to start companies, develop new products and create jobs," Doyle says.

UW-Madison neurologist Thomas Sutula, who chairs the UW's neurology department, is put forth as the poster-boy for the proposed streamlining. Sutula is also the founder of NeuroGenomeX, a company that hopes to develop research pioneered at the UW that could lead to the discovery of drugs to treat epilepsy and other brain diseases.

Sutula was quoted in news reports this week as saying the $15,000 lid only covers a couple of experiments and that it took him months to get the required clearance from the state attorney general. Sutula and other researchers say the process is slowing down the transfer of technology from the UW into real-world applications - and in some case threatening the venture capital that pushes the ideas into production.

We're all for streamlining and efficiency and we also take pride in the university's longstanding tradition of being a working university - one where the boundaries of the university are the boundaries of the state. That has meant a hands-on approach and a pioneering ethic that has looked to resolve problems, including problems that have plagued state industries.

More often than not that's been a very good thing.

But we're also mindful that - arcane or not - the intent of this law was to prevent researchers from using university facilities or personnel to do work that lines their own pockets or the pockets of companies they control.

In fact, in the Sutula case, two UW-Madison employees allege he has crossed the line and used university resources and staff to benefit NeuroGenomeX. They also say he shut down the Lou Gehrig's disease clinic in 2003 because it competed with his company for private grants.

Sutula says the university employees were paid by the company for work they did outside their regular hours and that the clinic was shut down for safety reasons.

The two employees making the accusations both worked in the clinic that was shut down and one was the administrator.

Corruption? Or sour grapes? That's hard to tell from here in Racine, but it's enough to clang a few alarm bells over the prospects of jettisoning the restrictions imposed by the old law.

Certainly we agree that waiting a year for a state attorney general's opinion on the legality of a contract is probably an inefficient delay. Moreover, it may not even address real issues of conflict of interest that could come up.

Doyle proposes skipping the required attorney general's office consent and instead having the contracts approved by UW officials who manage potential conflicts of interest. That seems a reasonable approach as long as that approval committee meets openly and is itself subject to scrutiny.

The synergies that can happen between research and industry can produce good results, but they also need regular watching.

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