Chuck:

You will have to refer to the terms and conditions of YOUR award; tempered
by knowledge of the state award.  In general, if your award does not speak
to copyright (which is completely different from inventions/patent, to
which Bayh-Dole pertains), copyrighted creations belong to the creator, or,
if terms of employment so state, to the creator's employer (there can be
other devolutions of title by prior contract, but employment arrangements
cover 95% of the cases).

However, your award may flow down the regs applied to the state agency, in
which cxase you need to look to that language.  Or, your award may be
silent, but the regs imposed on the state grant may have required them to
flow down copyright clauses to you and they failed to do so, in which case
I'd recommend conferring with your institutions's general counsel, and
discuss with institutional executives what risks you would incurr
(including political) if you "took advantage" of a state agency's erors.

I am not familiar with DOT copuright regs, but, generally, grantees get
title to copyrighted works while the federal government retains a
royalty-free (sometimes stated, "paid up"), non-exclusive, and irrevocable
right to reproduce, publish, or otherwise use the work for Federal
purposes, and to authorize others to do so.  (This language from A-110,
which may or may not apply, depending on DOT's regs applying to the prime
sponsor -- but probably do.)

I would argue strongly that the Federal government has no legitimate
Federal purpose in claiming a copyright that has commercial value.

Chuck

At 11:38 AM 9/26/97 -0700, you wrote:
>I'm hoping someone can give me insight into the ramifications of the
>Bayh-Dole act when federal money has passed through a state agency.
>
>We have a grant awarded from the state of Colorado for a project that
>has developed materials that can be copyrighted and used within
>business/corporate settings as well as within educational settings.
>The funds arise from federal pass through monies from the U.S.
>Department of Transportation.
>
>My question - who owns the copyright?  Can the university copyright
>these materials in the same way as if the funds were coming directly
>from the feds or do state regulations have precedence?  From the
>contracts and written letters of agreement between the project
>directors and the state presented to me so far, there is no mention
>of copyrights.
>
>Any insight would be helpful!
>
>Chuck Howard
>xxxxxx@uncrc.univnorthco.edu
>
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