Alabama university alumni invoke confederate statue law to protect buildings

Legal office of lawyers, justice and law concept / Getty Images
Legal office of lawyers, justice and law concept / Getty Images

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (AP) - Alumni from an Alabama university are calling on the state to stop the demolishing of old campus buildings by enforcing a law designed to protect Confederate statues.

Alabama A&M University alumni have asked the state's Attorney General to stop the university's plans to destroy several historical campus buildings to make space for new facilities, including a $50 million event center, WAFF-TV reported.

Two buildings have already been destroyed, while four remain to be demolished.

Alumni want the state to enforce a law which protects buildings and memorials more than 40 years old from being removed or altered without a waiver from the state.

The law had came out of the controversy over protecting confederate monuments in 2017.

Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said the facilities may qualify as a memorial building.

According to the university, many of the older buildings have become safety hazards and have not been used for nearly 20 years.

While the facilities will be removed, their significance will be "appropriately memorialized with markers," university spokesman Jerome Saintjones said.

"Once the building is taken down, your heritage, that history piece is gone," said Bernice Richardson, an alumni who also taught at the university for 35 years. "You can put a marker there but markers don't really tell the story," Richardson added.

The school said the buildings have been a disadvantage for the university in recruiting students.

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