No open meeting concerns at Wal-Mart tour

BEAVER DAM, Wis. - Not enough members of a legislative committee on personal privacy showed up at a tour of a Wal-Mart distribution center Tuesday to trigger Wisconsin's open meetings law.

A notice last week said Tuesday's tour was closed to the public even though a majority of the Assembly committee planned to be there, raising concerns that the state open meetings law would be violated.

But one committee member, Rep. Mary Williams, R-Medford, canceled late Monday, saying she didn't want there to be any questions about possible impropriety. Another committee member, Rep. Scott Suder, R-Abbotsford, was expected to attend but did not show up.

Ultimately, only two committee members took the tour. That is two short of a majority.

Committee chairman Rep. Marlin Schneider, a Democrat from Wisconsin Rapids, refused to comment during or after the two-hour tour. Schneider on Monday defended closing the tour to the public, saying he did not think it would violate state law since a notice announcing the meeting was issued properly and letting the public attend would be logistically difficult.

Wal-Mart permitted reporters to attend the briefing and tour but didn't allow photographs or recordings to be made.

The committee is considering a bill introduced by Schneider that would prohibit the sale of products containing operable radio frequency identification tags. The tags, known as RFID, are used for many purposes by governments and others, including retailers like Wal-Mart. The widespread use of the technology has raised privacy concerns.

Wal-Mart invited Schneider's committee on the tour, which included a briefing on how Wal-Mart uses RFIDs to track inventory.

Wal-Mart lobbyist Lisa Nelson said the retail giant used RFID to track products, not people.

"Customer privacy has to be a priority for us at Wal-Mart or people wouldn't shop at our stores," she said.

But Schneider said consumers who buy products with the devices in them could be tracked by anyone with the proper scanner. Schneider has been a longtime privacy advocate.

Nelson agreed with Schneider that shoppers' privacy must be protected and said Wal-Mart does not collect information about consumers.

Three other Assembly members not on the committee attended the tour, along with Waukesha Mayor Larry Nelson, Wal-Mart lobbyists, legislative staff members and others. The other committee member there was Rep. Amy Sue Vruwink, D-Milladore.

Later Tuesday, the group planned to tour a University of Wisconsin-Madison lab where research is being done on RFIDs. Even though the public notice said that tour was also closed to the public, UW lobbyist Don Nelson said the university always assumed the open meetings law applied to the tour and the public could attend.

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