News-Record.com

Universities and the communities surrounding them often have competing interests. In recent years, that conflict has been one of expansion vs. preservation, with neighborhoods feeling threatened by colleges gobbling up properties around them. As Judith Rodin, former president of the University of Pennsylvania and author of “The University and Urban Revival,” has said, universities often act like “4,000-pound gorillas, exercising their interests in a way that isn’t always neighborhood-friendly.”

That scenario looked like it was playing out in Greensboro, with some Warnersville residents feeling threatened by Greensboro College’s plans for a sports complex in their neighborhood.

But recent actions show the college acting less like King Kong and more like neighborhood preserver. Still, at least one neighborhood group — the Warnersville Community Coalition — continues to have questions.

Last week, the college unveiled its plans for the former GTCC property, which were created with the assistance of a community advisory council. Residents didn’t want the college to tear down the J.C. Price School, an historic African-American school on the property. They also didn’t want it to build a football stadium there, as they said it would disrupt their neighborhood.

The college obviously has listened. It no longer plans to build a football stadium there. It also said it will preserve the Price school and will use some of it for a museum about the neighborhood. The college also went the extra mile by deciding to establish all-tuition-paid scholarships for qualifying Warnersville residents.

But the Warnersville Community Coalition wants to know more. The coalition’s Otis Hairston says the college’s meeting with the community didn’t provide enough time for examining architectural drawings or enough information on the scholarships and museum. The coalition wants the college to send someone to its 7 p.m. Monday meeting at the Warnersville Community Center to answer questions.

Is the group too demanding? Not if you look at its request in context — the context of a neighborhood harmed by 1960s “redevelopment.” Greensboro College didn’t run the wrecking ball for that disaster. But the college is another outside actor.

Still, in light of the college’s positive proposal, it and Warnersville have a chance to move beyond this painful past. Greensboro College President Craven Williams says the college desires “to remain open to suggestions to guide us” and doesn’t want to move “headlong in a unilateral sort of way.” A college representative attending the coalition’s meeting would put Williams’ sentiment into action. Who knows? Maybe the meeting could be the catalyst for an alliance between college and coalition. The coalition’s members, with their knowledge, experience and talent (Hairston, for one, is a well-respected photographer with books to his credit), could help lead the college’s effort “to honor Warnersville” through its expansion.