Lincoln Alumni Sue Missouri for $549 Million Over HBCU Funding Gap
Updated
Updated · The Washington Post · Oct 7
Lincoln Alumni Sue Missouri for $549 Million Over HBCU Funding Gap
3 articles · Updated · The Washington Post · Oct 7
Summary
$549 million is what Lincoln University alumni and a former student seek in a federal lawsuit accusing Missouri of decades of discriminatory underfunding at the historically Black land-grant school.
The complaint says Missouri forced Lincoln to divert about $43.5 million from its operating budget over 16 years to cover required research matches, then Lincoln lost nearly $8 million in USDA funds from 2016 to 2018 when it could no longer backfill the gap.
Plaintiffs say the shortfall translated into broken infrastructure and weaker student support, citing years without reliable heat or hot water and a 2023 dorm pipe burst that spilled fecal matter.
The suit asks the court to require full dollar-for-dollar matching going forward and to create a remediation fund built on a Biden administration estimate that Missouri shorted Lincoln $361 million from 1987 to 2020.
The case extends a broader fight over 1890 land-grant HBCUs after federal investigators found a $12.6 billion aggregate gap across 16 states, even as most Black land-grant schools now receive their annual state match.