The University of North Carolina’s Board of Governors has halted plans to relocate the toppled Confederate statue to a new campus building.
According to a USA Today report, the governors met on Friday to discuss establishing a $5.3 million center to house the controversial Silent Sam, a Confederate statue, which was brought to the ground by the students earlier this year.
While rejecting the proposal, Harry Smith, Board of Governor’s chairman, favored constituting a five-member committee, which is expected to submit a report by March 15, 2019.
“We’re going to go back to the drawing board in a team-like approach and try to get it right, working together in a very healthy process,” Smith told The News Observer. “The goal, again, is simply to do the right thing.”
Last week, the decision of the university administrators to build a new facility to house Confederate statue received strong opposition from students who have been asking the school to roll back its plans. The students allege that the proposal was giving space to white supremacy on campus.
“Based on public safety, the plan states a preference for relocating the statue and the tablets to a secure off-campus location, such as the North Carolina Museum of History in downtown Raleigh. That option does not comply with current state law,” the university said in a statement last week.
During one of the anti-statute protests, police arrested and charged Maya Little with attacking a police officer and inciting a riot.
The statue, given by the United Daughters of the Confederacy in 1909, was erected in 1913. It has been the subject of a controversy and protests in the past few years.
Graduate Student Arrested Over Anti-Confederate Statue Protest at UNC
