Why Should Delaware Care?
Delaware taxpayers give the University of Delaware more than a hundred million dollars a year. But the public has little ability to find out how the school is spending the money because administrators argue that it is not a state agency subject to oversight.
A recent report from the Delaware auditor has rekindled a longstanding question of whether the state’s flagship university is a quasi-private entity, or a government agency subject to transparency laws.
The report published Tuesday by Delaware State Auditor Lydia York summarized a recent investigation into whether state agencies that employed individuals who held two taxpayer-funded jobs at the same time had properly accounted for their time worked.
The report stated that a risk posed by such “dual employment situations is the possibility of a person claiming to be in two places at the same time and being paid for the same hours by both employers.”
“This audit is simply about ensuring that employers paying staff with taxpayer dollars have policies in place preventing officials from being paid for two jobs at one time,” York said in a statement.
The investigators examined 22 state employees, including 13 current or former legislators, five employees of the courts, three people who have held prominent jobs in Gov. John Carney’s Administration; and Lt. Gov. Bethany Hall-Long.
While fifteen of those individuals held second jobs at the University of Delaware, the investigators struggled to conclude whether UD paid any of those employees for hours they had spent working elsewhere.
“This audit was hampered by significant constraints and excessive delays,” the report stated.
The struggle was a result of UD administrators insisting that the school does not have to comply with transparency laws that other taxpayer-funded entities are subject to, according to the report.
When reached for comment, a spokesman for York’s office said the auditor disagrees with UD’s assertion.
Delaware State Auditor Lydia York. Source: State of Delaware
The disagreement marks the latest in years of questions over UDs relationship with Delaware’s state government, which is providing the university with $144 million from its general fund this year.
In 2018, lawmakers debated whether their Joint Legislative Oversight and Sunset Committee could scrutinize the actions of the university’s board of trustees.
At the time, then-Sen. David Sokola argued that the committee had the right to conduct oversight, despite what he said were the university officials’ repeated assertions that the school was not part of the state government.
On the other side of the question at that time was then-Sen. Anthony Delcollo, who shared doubts about whether lawmakers should treat the school as a public institution, suggesting it could insulate UD from lawsuits under Delaware’s sovereign immunity laws.
Audit finding ‘improper and misplaced’?
In UD’s most recent arguments against state government oversight, school administrators said the state does not have the legal authority to investigate the school’s “compliance with laws that do not apply to the university,” even if the Delaware auditor is able to confirm that the employees in question were paid with taxpayer dollars, according to the report.
Such arguments were made at the onset of the auditor’s investigation in 2022, when UD refused to provide employment records for the 15 individuals in question, according to the report.
Nearly two years later, the school eventually agreed to share summaries of some of the records sought. The audit progressed based on those limited records and was completed last month.
Still, in a Sept 6 letter, UD attempted to refute the investigation arguing again that the school is not subject to the state’s dual-employment law, and calling the audit findings “improper and misplaced.”
In the findings, the report stated that two former UD employees – Hall-Long and former-Sen. Ernie Lopez – had “potentially” been paid by the university for hours that they had also worked in the elected positions.
While the two had potentially do so, the report was unable to say so conclusively, because “UD did not provide sufficient official records to allow us to verify whether the employees incurred coincident time,” the report stated.
It further stated that Lopez had reduced his UD salary by 10 percent “to account for time spent away on legislative business.”
Beyond UD, the investigators received sufficient employment records to conclude that Delaware Technical Community College had improperly paid two lawmakers – Rep.Melissa Minor-Brown former Rep. John L. Mitchell – for time that they were legislating in Dover.
The City of Dover paid another lawmaker – Rep. Andria L. Bennett – for work during weeks that she was in Legislative Hall, the report also stated, but noted that the city government did not maintain thorough enough records to conclude that the lawmaker had been paid double for the same hours worked.
And, finally, the investigators found that EastSide Charter School had reduced the pay of another lawmaker – Rep. Sherae’a Moore – for “coincident time,” but did not do so accurately.
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