The state Office of Information Practices said a consultant's evaluation of former University of Hawai'i-Manoa chancellor Peter Englert can be kept confidential.

The office reversed a previous opinion. "Our June 16 opinion was based upon the apparently erroneous characterization of the evaluation by the general counsel's office as a separate and completed evaluation rather than a resource used by interim president (David) McClain for the preparation of his own evaluation of the chancellor," OIP lawyer Cathy Takase wrote in an Aug. 17 letter to UH general counsel Walter Kirimitsu.

Englert's contract was not renewed after an evaluation in May.