Virginia GOP Asks State to Investigate University Costs, Including DEI Departments

The University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Va., at night on Feb 19, 2017. Thomas Jefferson founded the University of Virginia in 1819. (Felix Lipov/Shutterstock)

Virginia Assembly’s top Republicans asked the state’s governmental watchdog group to study the cost efficiency of public universities and, more specifically, the increasing cost of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) departments on college campuses.

Republicans, Speaker of the House Del. Todd Gilbert, and House Majority Del. Terry Kilgore sent a letter to the executive director of the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission (JLARC), Hal E. Greer, requesting that the agency investigate why higher education’s tuitions are so high, including the growing DEI departments at many of the institutions.

The GOP letter was sent in the wake of Virginia Democrats criticizing Martin Brown, director of the Office of Diversity, Opportunity, and Inclusion under Gov. Glenn Youngkin, for his April comments at the Virginia Military Institute, where he said DEI is dead.

“We’re not going to bring that cow up anymore; it’s dead. It was mandated by the General Assembly, but this governor [Gov. Glenn Youngkin] has a different philosophy of treating people with civility and discourse,” Brown said.

Democrats, House Minority Del. Don Scott, and Sen. Scott Surovell criticized Brown’s statements and sent a letter to Virginia’s Attorney General Jason Miyares, asking him why the equity office that a 2020 law authorized is not called Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, as the law requires.

Virginia General Assembly House of Delegates chamber in session in Richmond, Va., on Feb. 23, 2023. (Courtesy of Vision Times)

“Our first question is whether the Governor is bound by Virginia Law because apparently, he doesn’t think he is,” Surovell wrote in a May 2 Twitter post.

“The Governor does not have the legal power to change the names or mission of state employees who are in the Code - Virginia’s government is a democracy, not a business,” he said in a separate statement.

In addition, former Speaker of the Virginia House Democrat Del. Eileen Filler-Corn, Asian American and Pacific Islander Caucus, and the Virginia NAACP have all called for Brown to resign.

In 2020, Democrat lawmakers passed HB 394 to establish the “Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.” However, Martin’s official title with the state government is “Chief Diversity Officer and Director of Diversity, Opportunity, and Inclusion.”

Youngkin has repeatedly said he will prioritize equal opportunity over equity.

“Governor Youngkin will continue to advance equal opportunities—not equal outcomes—for all Virginians,” a spokesperson for Youngkin told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement. “This is too important of an issue to succumb to those seeking to cancel Chief Brown for challenging the groupthink of the progressive left’s pursuit of equity at any cost.”

Meanwhile, the GOP-led House Rules Committee introduced bill HJ 541, which would have funded a JLARC study of the rising cost of public higher education in the commonwealth and possibly eliminate DEI departments to cut costs. The measure identified 18 areas to study, including “the number of individuals employed by each public institution of higher education to promote or advance diversity, equity, and inclusion,” but failed to pass.

JLARC studied the rising cost of higher education in 2014 and produced a report in November titled “Addressing the Cost of Public Higher Education in Virginia.” The delegates asked Greer to clarify which of that report’s 16 recommendations were adopted by the education institutions.

The House leaders say the tuition for Virginia’s public universities are some of the most expensive in the nation. The delegates also noted the low enrollment numbers, insufficient student-age population, and increased costs for non-instructional/administrative staff, “particularly in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) positions. One such report stated that approximately 1,100 in-state students could receive a full-tuition scholarship for the amount spent on DEI salaries,” the letter stated.

According to a Heritage Foundation report, the University of Virginia had 6.5 DEI staff for every 100 professors. A Fox News review found that these institutions’ top DEI staff earn salaries ranging from $325,000 to $430,000.

The University of Virginia has 94 employees in its department, led by Kevin McDonald, vice president for DEI who makes $340,000 a year, records show. In contrast, an average Virginia full-time professor’s salary is about $175,000.

The Republicans asked Greer to initiate another report, which would help them better legislate in the coming year.

“An updated study and recommendations from JLARC will provide policy and budgetary leaders in the General Assembly with much-needed information as we consider how to address the looming challenges presented in higher education,” the GOP letter concluded.