More than four months after receiving expense-paid trips to the Sugar Bowl, some University of Hawai'i employees and others are being given an opportunity to pay the school back before their names are made public.

UH officials held a meeting yesterday with athletic department staffers and others, warning them that those whose trips were underwritten would have their names made public next month, officials confirmed.

UH associate athletic director Carl Clapp informed "20 to 25" people, mostly athletic department employees, of the policy yesterday. Clapp told them the session was in response to Freedom of Information requests from media outlets seeking the information, according to people present. Clapp said they were informed "of their options" and said others who made the trip are also being advised.

UH has estimated that it spent about $2 million to send its team and official party of about 500 to the Jan. 1 Bowl Championship Series game in New Orleans, though Clapp said an accounting isn't complete. UH lost to Georgia, 41-10.

The composition of the official traveling party has been a matter of controversy since the travel policy was drawn up by then-athletic director Herman Frazier in December, with some staffers complaining that others with little or no official duties were taken. In some cases, it has been alleged, family members were also taken.

The Advertiser repeatedly asked UH in January for a list of the travel party and filed a Freedom of Information request in March. Legislators questioned UH about its policy last month.

In a May 16 reply to The Advertiser, Ryan Akamine, UH associate general counsel, said a list of people — and their titles — who traveled as part of the official UH party to the Sugar Bowl was "not finalized."

The Advertiser has filed a complaint with the state's Office of Information Practices, seeking earlier disclosure.

Media lawyer Jeff Portnoy said UH's handling of the situation "is totally improper in every way — legally, philosophically and morally."

"It is a good thing they will be reimbursing the university, but the way (UH) is going about it is, to me, wrong," Portnoy said.

Meanwhile, Georgia earlier this month detailed to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution its 745-member travel party and accounted for $2.2 million in expenses for its Sugar Bowl trip.

"I know we can't go back and change what happened, but I think it is an embarrassing situation now for the athletic department at that time not to think about what the policy was or was going to be," state Rep. James Tokioka, D-15th (Lihu'e, Koloa) told KHON yesterday. "I feel sorry for the employees who, in my mind, were innocent in the whole process."