Richmond's police department paid $15,937 toward the bachelor's degree that has roiled the Virginia Commonwealth University campus this summer.

The payments -- which far exceeded reimbursements allowed for most city employees -- primarily went to the University of Phoenix for criminal justice courses that Rodney D. Monroe took while he was Richmond's chief of police.

How many of those courses were applied to the disputed degree he received from VCU was not clear. His transcript is protected under FERPA, the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act.

Under the Freedom of Information Act of Virginia, the Richmond Times-Dispatch obtained documents about the city's payments for Monroe's courses.

According to those documents, Richmond paid $13,773 for nine courses Monroe took through the University of Phoenix. The payments were made from September 2005 through January 2007.

The city also made two payments totaling $2,163 to VCU. The first payment of $1,411 was for spring tuition and fees in February 2007. A second payment the following January for $752 apparently was for graduate-level courses.

Tuition-reimbursement programs are common in the public and private sectors.

Monroe was covered under an administrative regulation for senior executives and unclassified city employees, according to Victoria Pearson, general counsel for Richmond's police department. However, a copy of that regulation did not address tuition coverage.

She referred questions to Linwood Norman, press secretary for Mayor L. Douglas Wilder. Neither would say whether Monroe's tuition payments were covered as part of a benefits package when he was hired.

For classified employees, Richmond's Web site states that its tuition-assistance program provides two-thirds reimbursement of the total tuition cost of courses taken per semester up to a maximum of $200 for undergraduate courses and $300 for graduate courses.

Under that policy, the maximum allowed for the nine University of Phoenix courses would have been $1,800. But the policy allows for reimbursement of up to only three courses in a fiscal year.

Monroe, now police chief in Charlotte, N.C., did not return phone calls. His spokesman said Monroe was extremely busy with the reorganization of the police department there.

City Auditor and Inspector General Umesh Dalal said he was not aware of any other policy.

"There is no separate policy for executives that I'm aware of," he said.

The city's policy requires reimbursement to the employee rather than payment directly to the institution. An administrative regulation that Wilder signed in February 2007 also requires "a legible copy of the official transcript or grade for an approved course for reimbursement."

The payments for Monroe's classes were made on his city-issued credit card.

Monroe received a bachelor's degree in interdisciplinary studies in May 2007. He told The Times-Dispatch in an interview before his graduation that he took two courses, or six credit hours, at VCU and also took online courses from the University of Phoenix.

VCU President Eugene P. Trani has said that Monroe took graduate courses at VCU after his graduation.

A university investigation in June found that Monroe was improperly awarded the degree because he did not meet the residency rule requiring students to receive 25 percent of credit hours from the university. Of the 120 hours required for his degree, Monroe should have received 30 credit hours from VCU.

VCU, which allowed Monroe to keep the degree, could face sanctions from its accrediting body, the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, based in Decatur, Ga.

VCU will send the results of its investigation to the commission by next month.

The University of Phoenix is accredited by the commission's regional counterpart, the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools.

Whether courses from a university are accepted as transfer credits generally depends on whether they match requirements of the major to which they would be applied, VCU spokeswoman Pam Lepley said.

In the past five academic years, 14 undergraduate students have transferred credits from the University of Phoenix.

Contact Karin Kapsidelis at (804) 649-6119 or kkapsidelis@timesdispatch.com.