GW filed suit against D.C. in U.S. District Court Wednesday claiming restrictions placed on the University’s campus plan approved last month by the D.C. Board of Zoning Adjustment are unconstitutional.

The conditions violate GW’s constitutional right to academic freedom, property rights and due process of the law, University Senior Counsel Charles Barber said.

“We challenge the fundamental authority of the BZA to consider these conditions,” he said, referring to parts of the campus plan that cap undergraduate enrollment and prohibit non-residential construction projects. The restrictions apply until GW houses 70 percent of its students on campus, the BZA decided March 29.

Barber said the zoning board has no jurisdiction over GW’s enrollment and whether the University should build academic buildings. He called BZA restrictions a violation of GW’s First Amendment right to academic freedom.

“We feel that the BZA has interjected itself into the academic workings
of the University,” he said.

Barber said the order infringes on GW’s rights under the Fifth Amendment “takings clause,” which prohibits the government from taking property without compensation.

“They say we can’t use property to build anything else other than residence halls,” he said. “We’ve been put in a box that’s going to be pretty hard to get out of.”

The campus plan excludes students living in the Hall on Virginia Avenue, Aston Hall and the new Elliott School of International Affairs complex in the 70-percent target because these buildings lie outside campus boundaries. Barber said this neglects about 590 beds in buildings that are legally residence halls.

The Fifth Amendment also “protects the University’s interest in developing its property in accordance with its academic purpose without arbitrary or capricious governmental restrictions,” according to the complaint filed Wednesday.

Barber said GW is subject to more restrictive development conditions than other D.C. institutions. He said D.C. is denying GW equal protection under the law and due process because it has taken away the University’s ability to apply for new projects – which has slowed plans for a business school addition.

“That project is in limbo now until we clarify this order,” Barber said.

Barber called BZA restrictions “arbitrary,” and said the restrictions had no support in the record of testimony during campus plan hearings.

He said GW already plans to house 70 percent of its students within five years and will continue to cap the total student population at 20,000.

“We’ve always lived with that (cap), and we’re ready to continue to live with that,” Barber said. “We thought we could get the 70 percent in five years. It takes time to build residence halls.”

But an undergraduate cap was not in the plans, because undergraduate numbers depend on graduate school enrollment, Barber said.

Barber said GW’s volume of graduate school applications is based on the current job market. If the economy is strong, more graduates will go to work rather than continue their education, he said.

“We’ve been able to adjust to the market with our overall student enrollment,” Barber said. “That shouldn’t be a zoning decision, how many undergraduates we have.”