Troubling questions ahead
Among the nagging questions that remain is whether Ayers Attorney Alvin Chambliss will agree to the settlement or persist, as he has for the last 26 years, in reaching what he has stated to be a fair and just settlement.
Under the terms of the settlement offer, $2.5 million has been set aside for attorney fees to be divided among Chambliss, North Mississippi Rural Legal Services and the Center for Law and Education.
Noted higher education attorney William "Buddy" Blakey admits that he isn't familiar with the details of the case but says the settlement raises a few basic questions. As to the settlement requirement that the Black colleges achieve and sustain for two years a White enrollment of 10 percent in order to trigger funding, he asks, "Why do they have to do anything other than enhance themselves to make themselves more attractive?" He also wonders whether the $105 million in endowment funds that is to be split by the three HBCUs is enough to make the schools attractive. "You could spend that on the engineering program alone," says Blakey.
The 10 percent standard also troubles Marc Ward, a 2000 graduate of Alcorn State and a legislative aide to Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss.
"It is not inherently or logically fair to place a stricter standard on the group that is bringing the suit and not on the previously White institutions," says Ward.
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