The problem started more than a century ago, when the federal government began funding land-grant colleges, originally segregated by race.
In Tennessee, that meant money for continued operations at the all-white University of Tennessee and for the establishment of what is now called Tennessee State University, which allowed Black students to attend. In the years since, the two schools have been funded unequally, and not just because UT has more students. After years of pressure, mostly from Black state lawmakers, the Tennessee legislature is seeking to make amends.
A joint committee established by the Republican speakers of the House and Senate concluded months of studying the issue late in June, but the work is not done: Before adjourning, the group tasked the Tennessee Department of Finance & Administration and the Tennessee Higher Education Commission with meeting with TSU leadership to come up with possible remedies to be included in future state budgets. The goal is to have recommendations in the next couple of months.
But one thing is for sure: TSU is not simply going to get a check for the total estimated missing money — one such estimate compiled during the study process pegged the missing money north of half a billion dollars.
“I don’t care if that’s 100 percent accurate, that’s just not going to happen,” GOP Sen. Richard Briggs, a co-chair of the study committee, said at its last meeting. “We really have to look at what we need to do going forward. It has to be done in the framework of what the state can afford. We don’t want to look back, but [instead look] at what we can do to make things better.”
Instead of a lump sum, Briggs imagines state spending on maintenance and capital projects, scholarships and other needs at TSU over the course of several years.
The bipartisan study committee undertook an exercise that, at least according to the general GOP understanding of the term, would fall under the umbrella of the dreaded critical race theory. A bad, racist thing happened many years ago (the Republicans agree), and (here many Republicans agree again) the effects of that bad, racist action still linger. The effects even manifest physically, as TSU boosters point out that a lack of funding has led to backlogs of maintenance and new construction.
And some Republicans are skeptical of the TSU study process. Republican Rep. Chris Todd, a member of the study committee, stressed repeatedly that he didn’t “want to move forward with assumptions that there’s something owed.” That’s despite at times incomplete state records showing that the state disbursed no money for TSU’s land-grant programs some years, among other findings by the legislature’s analysts showing decades of funding disparities.
“Part of the challenge is to walk that delicate line, knowing the present-day situation that you're in, because you don’t want to make it seem like it's your fault, but we have to say somebody made the decision to say ‘don’t fund TSU,’ ” said Democratic Rep. Harold Love, co-chair of the committee and a TSU alum. “We know that there was a problem. That’s clear. … Now the question becomes, how do you link the current condition and some historical conditions of Tennessee State with that inequitable funding?”
“This is our school,” Love added. “We’re state legislators. This is one of our institutions. How do we not look for a way to make it the very best it can be, particularly in light of the fact that we know that there were some issues with this funding?”
Butch Eley, Gov. Bill Lee’s finance commissioner, said, “I look forward to working with THEC and TSU to look at this issue and try to come up with a solution.”
TSU President Glenda Glover said she was confident that “something is going to happen” as a result of the meetings, which she celebrated for bringing attention to an issue that TSU supporters have been talking about for years.
“Since we have two land-grant institutions in Tennessee, and one has received a substantial amount of funding and the other has received a pitiful amount of funding,” said Glover, “the committee should look and see what’s the amount owed to TSU … and come up with a good model to determine arrearages and how can we pay that arrearage to TSU. We just want to be treated fairly.”
