Gov. Abigail Spanberger has rather emphatically removed John Rocovich from the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors, effectively immediately, in a letter made public on Thursday in which she accused the board rector of misconduct.
“Your conduct has violated the Code of Conduct for Commonwealth Appointees to Boards, Authorities, & Commissions, the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors’ Code of Ethics, and the governing statutes requiring members to act in accordance with the best interests of Virginia Tech,” Spanberger wrote in the letter, dated Wednesday, May 27.
The letter didn’t specify the alleged misconduct.
Spanberger appointed Ed Baine, the president of Dominion Energy, to complete Rocovich’s term on the Board, which ends on June 30, 2027.
Baine donated $5,000 to the Spanberger gubernatorial campaign in 2025, according to the Virginia Public Access Project donor database.
Spanberger also announced on Thursday that Sharon Brickhouse Martin, previously announced to serve a term on the Virginia Tech Board beginning on July 1, has been appointed to fill an open term ending on June 30, and then will begin to serve her full term on July 1.
Martin is vice president of health services integration at VHC Health, a nonprofit healthcare system located in Arlington.
I don’t see any political contributions under her name in online records.
What’s going on here is the delayed political takeover of Virginia Tech, at a key time at the Blacksburg school.
ICYMI
Virginia Tech President Tim Sands announced in April his intention to step down, opening up that job at a time when Glenn Youngkin appointees, led by Rocovich, had total control of the Board of Visitors.
Rocovich said last month that he expected a new president to be named before the academic year begins on July 1, which is also when four Spanberger appointees were to take their spots on the board.
With this week’s maneuvering, the Youngkin appointees will still have an 8-5 BOV majority on July 1 and going forward in the 2026-2027 academic year, with two of Youngkin’s appointees cycling off the board on June 30, 2027.
Gotta wonder here if Spanberger’s team will dig up some more misconduct between now and any votes on a new president to avoid what happened at the top at the University of Virginia.
ICYMI
- Spanberger tells UVA Board of Visitors to hit pause on presidential search
- Spanberger’s UVA Board of Visitors confirms the Scott Beardsley mistake
A Youngkin majority on the UVA Board of Visitors was able to get help from the Trump Department of Justice in its effort to force Jim Ryan out as president, in enough time to do a rushed job leading to the appointment in December of MAGA-lite Scott Beardsley to be his successor.
Spanberger engineered a political overhaul of the UVA Board in her first weekend in office, but decided not to press the issue of the appointment of Beardsley, who remains in the president post.
ICYMI
Hanging over the situation at Virginia Tech is the need to hire a new director of athletics, with the long-time AD, Whit Babcock, announcing last month his intention to step down on June 30.
That opening complicates the school’s move to launch what it has styled its Invest to Win initiative, a scheme rolled out last year that has set a $229 million fundraising goal with the stated aim to modernize Tech Athletics.
Ideally, you’d want to have a new AD in place as soon as possible, at the latest, ahead of the football season, but not having a president beyond the lame-duck Sands will make it difficult to attract top candidates for the job.
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Chris Graham
