By James Wright, Special to the AFRO, jwright@afro.com

The chairman of the legal redress committee of the Prince George’s County NAACP has been given the green light to consider suing the University of Maryland, College Park for its alleged racist practices and culture that harm African American students, faculty and staff.

Talib Karim, a well-known attorney who is licensed to practice in the District of Columbia and Maryland, told NAACP members at its July 19 meeting that the University of Maryland is not hospitable to Blacks.

Talib Karim says the Prince George’s County NAACP may sue the University of Maryland. (Courtesy Photo)

“I was at Bowie State University teaching a course last year when a student, Richard Collins III walked in,” Karim said to a group of 20 people. “This student was on his way to a promising military career when he was killed on the campus of the University of Maryland. He was murdered by a young man who professed White supremacist views.

“It is my understanding now that the murderer is trying to have his supremacist views not aired before a jury so he won’t get hate crime charges.”

Karim said he supports the landmark lawsuit that demands that African-American universities in Maryland get equitable funding from the state that the White universities get. He said as he made his views known, Maryland Del. Angela Angel (D-District 25) told him about the complaints she has heard from Black students and faculty at the University of Maryland.

The University of Maryland was founded on March 6, 1856 in College Park, Md., as the flagship public higher education institution in the state. It is a land grant university with an extensive academic program and offers 100 undergraduate and 120 graduate majors for a student body of 39,000.

The university operates on a $2.1 billion budget and has an endowment of $542.1 million. Known nationally as a “Public Ivy” institution, Maryland has always been predominantly White and only 10. 8 percent of its students are Black.

Karim notes that Prince George’s County is 62.70 percent Black while the state of Maryland is 31 percent Black and is set to be majority-minority by 2020, according to Will Frey, the demographer for the Brookings Institution. He said the disparity in the Black student-Black state resident ratio is unfair.

“The university has a small number of Black students and is located in predominantly Black Prince George’s County,” Karim said. “Black Marylanders make up a small segment of the Black students on that university.”

Karim noted that Black Marylanders pay taxes to support the university and therefore more Black students, particularly from Prince George’s County, should be admitted there. He said the process of the lawsuit won’t be easy.

“This is a long, arduous process and it will be a multi-year process but I have the backing of the national legal counsel,” Karim said.