Calling for students to hold their school accountable in considering the needs of the community, panelists outspoken against Columbia's plans for expansion into Manhattanville tried to educate SIPA students about human rights issues in their own backyard.
Sponsored by SIPA's Human Rights Working Group, the panel consisted of Pat Jones, second vice-chair of Community Board 9, Nellie Bailey, director of the Harlem Tenants Council, Tom DeMott, a member of the Coalition to Preserve Community, and Nell Geiser, CC '06, a member of the Student Coalition on Expansion and Gentrification.
A brief video, which featured several community members, set the stage for the discussion. The film questioned whether Columbia really has the best interests of the community in mind or if it is acting as a massive, self-concerned corporation.
"Columbia wants to create the concept that there's another way to do this where there can be some sort of love-fest, where we come together in an agreement," DeMott said in the film. "We're not so much worried about working together with Columbia. And what we're doing is to try and go against the big guy and defeat him."
Addressing the audience, Jones said, "Columbia's goal is to pretty much level [Manhattanville]."
She gave an overview of CB9's 197-A advisory land use plan, which, if passed, would serve as a guide for future development and the platform for any community benefits agreement between the University and local residents.
Bailey's speech concentrated on the displacement of 7,000 people who lived on the land of what is now East Campus and on the student uprising that took place in 1968. She alleged that Columbia's presence and its expansion efforts have made it untenable for low-income individuals to live in the gentrified Upper West Side. She added that community members believe that the University is positioning itself for for-profit biotech activities on the Manhattanville campus that will not benefit local residents.
University officials have stated publicly that they understood the community's concerns, but that it was premature to make claims about research that may or may not take place in buildings that haven't been built.
"The community is certainly not leaving," Bailey said. "You as students have an investment in this institution, not only to prepare yourselves professionally but, we hope, to also prepare yourselves to be a member of the world community, a community of social justice and fairness."
Both Bailey and DeMott made references to building a tent city, which CPC plans to use as a protest against Columbia's expansion in April. DeMott said that this sort of protest is appropriate because President Lee Bollinger has failed to speak directly to the members of the West Harlem community about their concerns.
Bollinger did speak publicly and fielded questions at a Community Board 9 meeting this past April, but has not heeded invitations to attend CPC meetings.
The discussion ended with a question from first-year SIPA student Vincent Villano, "How might we able to get President Bollinger to actually talk to the community?"
DeMott responded, "Storm his office."