Civil rights groups say the Antioch Police force harassed African-American renters. 
An Oakland, Calif.-area police force established a special unit designed to run the Black folks out of town, according to civil rights groups who have filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of African-American renters who get federal public housing aid. Originally, the lawsuit, filed in a federal court in San Francisco, included just five renters, but it was widened this week to cover all past and present Black renters who received federal vouchers in the East Bay suburb of Antioch, KTVU reports. The lawsuit alleges that Antioch officials created a special police unit called the Community Action Team to harass new African-American renters “by pressuring landlords and housing authority officials to evict Black tenants receiving vouchers,” the television station reports. Among the tactics allegedly used by Antioch Police were illegal search warrants or home searches without any warrants at all. Antioch officials deny the charges, saying the special police unit was created in July 2006 “in response to neighborhood demands for help in dealing with growing crime rates and persistent neighborhood problems.” The Community Action Team has been “extremely successful” in eradicating crime, they said, expressing disappointment that the civil rights groups filed a suit rather than negotiate with Antioch officials. “We believe that any objective review of our city’s policing efforts will reveal that these efforts are focused exclusively on criminal and/or dangerous behavior,” the statement said. “Claims of other, sinister motivations are untrue and irresponsible.”

Fisk climbs major money hurdle Fisk University climbed a major money hurdle this week, raising $4 million and qualifying for grant that will keep the doors of the financially troubled Tennessee-based Black college open, Shauntel Lowe of Black College Wire reports. Late last month, Fisk announced that it had raised $4 million in unrestricted funds just days before a June 30 deadline. By meeting the challenge, the campus will receive a $2 million grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Earlier in the year, Mellon also gave the university a $1 million contribution. “Thirty-four percent of contributions in support of the Mellon Foundation Challenge came from Middle Tennessee, and it is clear that with the help of our alumni, the community of faith, government leaders, as well as our corporate and foundation partners we can claim great victory this year,” said university President Hazel R. O’Leary. The institution is expected to raise more than $8.3 million this year, Lowe reports. Matthew Kennedy, the former director and concert pianist of the legendary Fisk Jubilee Singers, told Black College Wire that he thought Fisk would reach its goal. “I’m a very positive thinking person and I just didn’t think that Fisk would be faced with serious consequences such as having to close and I don’t think the public will let that happen because of the long legacy in the field of education that Fisk has,” said Kennedy, 87.