VUU’s pledge to preserve Community Hospital falls flat [Video]

Oh what a tangled web they weave when institutions of higher education choose to go into the real estate business.

Virginia Union University, in its initial plan to tear down the old Richmond Community Hospital building as part of a residential development, declared war on Black history and rallied residents and preservationists against the $40 million project.

VUU later said it would preserve the façade of the art deco hospital, which was founded by Black medical professionals during the Great Depression to meet the needs of African Americans in a rigidly segregated city. But this pledge satisfied no one in opposition.

Sa’ad El-Amin, a former member of the Richmond City Council, filed a lawsuit in Richmond Circuit Court against VUU; its president, Hakim Lucas; and W. Franklyn Richardson, chair of the school’s board of trustees. El-Amin argues that after Community Hospital moved to a new building in Church Hill in …