Community college policy under review
N.C. system leaders want attorney general's opinion on rule's legality
MARK JOHNSON
mjohnson@charlotteobserver.com

RALEIGH --Leaders of North Carolina's community college system have asked state Attorney General Roy Cooper to review whether they acted legally by requiring the system's 58 colleges to admit illegal immigrants.

The request comes as Martin Lancaster, outgoing president of the community college system and a former Democratic congressman, issued his first statement on the controversy since it erupted more than a week ago.

Lancaster defended the new policy as benefiting students who, in many cases, were brought to North Carolina as children. He also suggested that, if left uneducated, those children could cost the state in future social services or in acts of violence or terrorism.

The community college system's top lawyer, David Sullivan, dispatched a letter Monday asking Cooper, a Democrat, for his opinion on whether community college administrators properly interpreted state and federal law.

"Our position has been called into question by many," said community colleges spokeswoman Audrey Bailey. "While we are confident that we are correct in our interpretation, we want verification from the Attorney General in hopes that it will quell some of the comments."

Since the Observer published a story about the controversy last week, the community college system's offices have received a stream of complaints.

N.C. Sen. Fred Smith, a Republican candidate for governor, also sent Cooper a letter Monday asking him to review the system's policy.

"We are sending a message to students and employers that North Carolina will not only ignore federal immigration law, but provide encouragement and assistance to individuals who are breaking the law," Smith wrote to Cooper. "Surely, this is not the lesson we want to impart through our school system."

Community college administrators said 340 illegal immigrants currently attend community colleges out of the 270,000 students pursuing degrees. The undocumented students pay out-of-state tuition, about $7,500, while the cost of their classes is about $5,400. That figure, though, does not include the schools' capital expenses, such as construction and maintenance of buildings.

Sullivan sent a memo Nov. 7 to all campuses saying they must admit illegal immigrants. He wrote that the order was based on a review of both the system's open-door admissions policy and an informal opinion from the office of then-Attorney General Mike Easley in 1997 regarding non-academic admission requirements.

Easley, a Democrat and governor since 2001, initially refused to take a position on the policy last week, but on Friday told the Observer he supports it.

Lancaster's statement said, among other points, that European countries denying basic services to immigrants have created a permanent underclass now responsible for violence and terrorism in those countries.

"By refusing to educate and make productive members of our society the children of undocumented aliens," Lancaster wrote, "North Carolina and the United States face that same eventuality."

Andrew Reynolds, a British citizen and expert on European politics at UNC Chapel Hill, said Lancaster's argument carries an element of truth, as illustrated by recent riots in predominantly immigrant suburbs of Paris.

"In some European countries," Reynolds said, "especially France and to some degree Spain, there is evidence that a whole host of marginalizing policies that keep minorities out of the mainstream is one of the factors that leads to anti-government violence."

Lancaster also argued that every wave of immigration in American history has faced the same sort of opposition now raised against Hispanics. That history applies to those who have complained to Lancaster's office, he said, judging by their surnames.

"Fifty or a hundred years ago," Lancaster said, "their grandparents or great grandparents faced the same opposition that they are now voicing."

Martin Lancaster's statement:
http://www.ncccs.cc.nc.us/News_Releases ... mented.htm

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