The Pennsylvania State Supreme Court will review whether the salaries of Joe Paterno and three other Penn State administrators should be made public, according to a court order issued Tuesday.

Jan Murphy, a Harrisburg Patriot-News reporter, requested the salaries of the officials from the State Employers Retirement System in December 2002 through Pennsylvania's Right-to-Know Act.

The Patriot-News is also seeking the salaries of Penn State budget officer Richard Althouse, Penn State Vice President and Provost Rodney Erickson and Penn State Senior Vice President for Finance Gary Schultz.

A commonwealth court ruled 3-2 in favor of the newspaper in an August 2005 decision. Penn State filed an appeal in September 2005 to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.

Tuesday's court order states that Cynthia Baldwin, who chairs the Penn State Board of Trustees and was appointed in February to the state Supreme Court, was not involved in the decision to review the case and will not take part in the hearings.

Baldwin did not return calls by press time.

Craig Staudenmaier, a lawyer representing Murphy and the Patriot-News, said he did not know when the hearing would occur but that the court should release a briefing schedule in a few weeks. Both sides will then make oral arguments, and the court will make a decision, he said.

"The whole thing will probably take at least a year, maybe longer," he said.

He was not surprised that the state Supreme Court decided to hear the appeal.

"I think the issues are fairly novel and important," he said.

Staudenmaier said he does not expect to change his strategy for the Supreme Court arguments.

"We've won every step of the way," he said. "We think this is pretty clear that this is public information."

Penn State spokesman Tysen Kendig wrote in an e-mail message that the university "certainly is pleased" that the Supreme Court has decided to hear the appeal.

"The university maintains that individual employee salary information is protected by a person's common law right to privacy, and we're eager to make that case before the court," Kendig wrote.