A top LSU official told a Board of Regents panel earlier this month that the state’s flagship university can take anywhere from 67 to 222 days to bring a Title IX investigation to completion.
Nearly four years after a USA Today investigation found major faults in LSU’s Title IX office, advocates for students want LSU to do better. But some workers within the office, which is responsible for investigating complaints about sexual harassment and misconduct as well as other discrimination claims, aren’t surprised at the length of investigations.
“This is a good example,” said Anne LaHaye, a retired FBI investigator who quit investigating Title IX complaints at LSU after less than a year due to what she described as a hostile work environment. “It was a sexual assault case … I finished that final investigative report and it took [my supervisor], if I’m not mistaken, one-and-a-half to two months to approve that report.”
Despite LSU leadership’s promised reform, some employees in the Division of Engagement, Civil Rights and Title IX say it’s become a toxic and dysfunctional environment, evidenced by significant employee turnover and lags in completing investigations. A university spokesman, however, pushed back on those claims, saying the office has been properly staffed and worked to increase awareness and training on Title IX issues.
The Louisiana Illuminator and Tiger Rag interviewed three former employees and two former student workers and obtained documents through public records requests for this report.
Earlier this month, Todd Manuel, LSU’s vice president over the Division of Engagement, Civil Rights and Title IX, told the Power-Based Violence Review Panel, a public body under the Louisiana Board of Regents that advises state colleges and universities, that it can take LSU more than seven months to complete investigations into Title IX complaints. While Manuel said 222 days was an outlier, LSU’s average length of investigation is still longer than its peers, generally between 60 and 90 days.
According to the University of Louisiana System, investigations take between 45 and 60 days on average at its nine universities. The Southern University System reported a 60-day average, and Louisiana Community and Technical College System investigations take between 60 and 90 days. An administrator for LCTCS explained their investigations take longer than its peers because they primarily serve a nontraditional student population.
‘Borderline unacceptable’
When he took the top job in 2022, Manuel had no prior experience working in higher education and his hiring raised red flags from the start for some critics. Before coming to LSU, Manuel was a diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) executive at Entergy, an electric utility company. He held a similar role with the Edison Electric Institute, an organization for investor-owned utility companies. Manuel worked with a Baton Rouge law firm for 14 years before moving to the utilities industry.
“I found Manuel to be borderline unacceptable,” one administrator who took part in Manuel’s interview wrote on a feedback form. The forms, a standard part of the hiring process for any administrator, were obtained through a public records request. This feedback process is almost always anonymous to encourage honesty.
“He lacks any experience working in higher education and lacks fundamental understanding of how higher education institutions operate,” another staff member wrote. “He is grossly unqualified for the position.”
Another staff member wrote that “his lack of experience in Title IX is worrisome as to how he will be able to understand the support that is needed for that office.”
State Sen. Beth Mizell, R-Franklinton, led the legislative fight for Title IX reform at Louisiana colleges after the USA Today report. When she met Manuel shortly after his hiring, she thought he was a nice enough man, but his lack of experience with Title IX was a concern, she said in an interview.
“I didn’t get the feeling that this was his crusade, and we really need somebody who sees this as their crusade,” Mizell said. “Because, my God, that’s the only way you’re gonna have to really, I hate to say, shake the tiger loose, but you’re gonna really have to shake it loose to fix it.”
Mizell said LSU made her aware of a complaint that had been filed against the university from within the Title IX office, but said university officials declined to share details. An employee interviewed for this report confirmed she filed a formal grievance with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that details what she described as a toxic workplace environment. She shared a copy of the complaint with the Illuminator and Tiger Rag.
“Throughout my employment I have been experiencing discrimination based on my disability,” the employee wrote to the EEOC. “[My supervisor] is responsible for creating a hostile work environment that is ongoing.”
Manuel did not respond to an interview request. After the Illuminator and Tiger Rag asked for the interview, LSU spokesman Todd Woodward said in an email that Manuel directed him to reach out and solicit questions. Woodward declined to answer most of the questions submitted to him for this report.
Woodward said Manuel has successfully staffed his office.
“He is now up to 54 confidential advisors and is fully staffed as defined by both Husch Blackwell and Baker Tilly,” Woodward said, referring to the two law firms LSU hired to guide its Title IX reforms.
A confidential supporter or adviser is a faculty or staff member who receives additional training to support someone who has experienced sexual misconduct. They can help students and employees with the Title IX process or with identifying resources without being required to report any allegations.
Woodward said Manuel has also expanded Title IX outreach and increased student and employee completion of power-based violence training.
However, six employees within the Division of Engagement, Civil Rights and Title IX, which usually has around 20 employees, have left their position soon after taking a job in the division since Manuel took over, according to university records.
One of those employees identified the toxic environment as the reason for her departure.
“As a result of this position, my mental and emotional health has rapidly declined, and my experience in this department at LSU has been anything but enjoyable,” the employee wrote in her resignation letter.
Productivity suffers in toxic workplace
LSU is required to compile data on how it handles Title IX complaints and how many are found to be valid. Publicly available reports show most hit a dead end after complainants don’t respond when the university reaches out to them.
Some current and former employees in LSU’s Title IX office said the work environment hurts the ability to investigate abuse, assist complainants and take corrective action.
LaHaye, who went to work for LSU after more than 20 years as an FBI investigator, left the Title IX office after less than a year. Among the procedural policies she questioned was a prohibition against talking to other investigators about her work.
Other former and current employees from the division described emotional abuse at work. They asked for their names to be withheld, fearing possible retribution from LSU.
“The toxicity of the office, you’ve got two or three in that office that kind of stick together,” LaHaye said. “And then you’ve got everybody else who’s … the receivers of the wrath of whatever they want to come up with.”
At the root is a “lack of leadership,” LaHaye said, pointing to Manuel and her direct supervisor, Arlette Henderson, who she described as a “dictator.” Henderson, who is currently on unpaid leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act, confirmed that she’s absent from work to the Illuminator and Tiger Rag but declined to speak further, citing a fear of retaliation.
LaHaye said the workplace was experiencing some of the same behavior the office is tasked with preventing on campus.
“It’s not healthy. It’s a toxic environment,” LaHaye said.
Umbrella approach in question
An expert on how universities crack down on sexual assault and harassment on campus says an oversight system like the one LSU has in place is prone to interoffice turmoil and letting transgressions go unpunished.
Nicole Bedera is a Minnesota-based sociologist, author and sexual assault prevention and response consultant. More than a decade of her work has focused on college campuses and the LGBTQ community.
Her research into Title IX enforcement at the college level has given her insight into how various schools handle allegations of gender- and power-based violence as well as discrimination complaints. However, LSU has not been a subject of her research.
When universities place their Title IX, civil rights and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) offices under the same roof, toxic environments are not unusual, Bedera said she discovered in her research. Bedera’s book, “On the Wrong Side,” details the internal actions of college Title IX offices.
“You end up with a lot of behavior in these types of umbrella offices that doesn’t match up with the legal responsibilities that are placed on the school by the law or the federal government,” Bedera said. “The other issue is that once you have [a] hostile environment within these offices, that hostility [can] grind absolutely all work in the office to a halt.”
If employees don’t feel safe and comfortable within an office that deals with such difficult topics, the work doesn’t get done, Bedera said, adding that having one office that handles a broad variety of complaints often means employees in that office have nowhere else to turn if they experience the misconduct they are supposed to investigate..
“The larger these offices are, the greater the likelihood of abuse, and the greater the likelihood that once they have this sort of umbrella approach, there’s no one else to go to,” Bedera said.
