No Land Grab

These same voices were also shockingly muted on the revelation that Columbia University Pediatric AIDS Clinical Trials Unit since the late nineteen eighties conducted over two hundred clinical trials involving thousands of foster children and infants, virtually all Black and Latino at Washington Heights' Incarnation Children Center even though federal guidelines require researchers and their oversight boards to appoint independent advocates for any foster child enrolled in a narrow class of studies that involved greater than minimal risk. Displaying the same culture of arrogance as the University's land grab, a rep for Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center said, "Our position is that advocates weren't needed". In test studies at least 10 children were reported to have died.

The drug experiments were sponsored in conjunction with pharmaceuticals companies such as GlaxoSmithKline whose annual worldwide market for AIDS medications was estimated at. $5 billion in 2002. For sure, Columbia University's expansion is about business and making money on patents from its bio-research, including the AIDS experiment on Black and Latino children. In 2006 alone Columbia pulled in $230 million on patents and royalties, the top earner of licensing revenue among American universities.

Democratic party operative Bill Lynch is pumping the hype that Columbia university's expansion will bring jobs and prosperity to West Harlem, even though for decades the university has consistently failed to implement a comprehensive community employment program for its lucrative real estate empire. And clearly within this current expansion scheme community residents will receive only low wage jobs, mostly as day laborers. Columbia's contempt for the Harlem community is best illustrated in their recent proposal to a group of Manhattanville public housing residents who were offered "temporary" janitorial jobs (a week or two) while the university's permanent janitorial staff was on summer vacation. One of the university's numerous recently hired Black staffers quipped, "There is no shame in being a janitor" for Columbia.

Columbia University's expansion cannot be viewed in isolation from the overall gentrification of Harlem, nor the influence it exerts within the Upper Manhattan Empowerment Zone through its former employee, Ken Knuckles, now the President and CEO of the UMEZ. Columbia has eyed Harlem's real estate for decades, the most memorable being their attempt to grab Morningside Park in 1968 and their success in capturing the Audubon Ballroom. Clearly their ultimate goal is to physically link their 116th Street campus along the West Harlem corridor up to 168th Street, made possible by the willing complicity of Harlem's political and civic establishment. The masses of Blacks, especially the poor and working classes, are exacerbated, angry, demoralized and put off with the political leadership in Harlem and frankly, throughout the city with few exceptions. The people understand fundamentally that there is no political will from elected officials to provide a viable alternative to the powers-that-be including Columbia University’s land grab that will permanently alter the ethnic, socio-economic and political demographics of West Harlem, and by extension the greater community of Harlem. We desperately need the support of residents, not-for-profit groups, civic and ecumenical leaders to speak out against this overt travesty that seeks to put a " It's For Your Own Good Black spin" on Columbia's expansion that will ultimately drive out poor and working class Blacks and Latinos.

Please come early and sign up to speak (3 minutes maximum) about how this kind of university expansion destroys neighborhoods across the city.

Wednesday, August 15 at the Manhattanville Community Center, 530 West 133rd Street, Manhattan, between Broadway and Amsterdam.

The hearing starts at 6:30 pm but we expect Columbia to pack the place early, so come by 5:30 or 6:00.

For more information contact Nellie Bailey of the Harlem Tenants Council at 212-234-5005 or harlemtenants@aol.com or nelliehester@yahoo.com. Pick up literature and get more information by attending the Townhall meeting of the Harlem Tenants Council on Tuesday, August 14th at St. Ambrose Church, 9 West 130th Street (between Fifth and Lenox Avenues) from 6 PM to 8 PM. Visit the website of stopcolumbia.org for additional information you might want to review for your three minute remarks.