Students and faculty members of color at UMass Boston complain that the university is losing faculty of color and ignoring the needs of the predominantly urban and working-class student body it has traditionally served.

Those concerns made their way to the State House, where members of the Legislative Black Caucus last year requested a meeting with members of the UMass Boston board of trustees. On October 28, Caucus members, city councilors Chuck Turner, Charles Yancey and Felix Arroyo and former state Rep. Mel King met with the trustees and requested that the body investigate.

“We presented them with a number of issues and concerns,” King recalls. “They promised us that by the first of the year we’d have a response.”

Carl White, the sole African American on the board, was reportedly charged with heading the investigation. Yet as of Monday, King says he has not received a response.

“I am anticipating hearing from them any day now,” he said. “They did make a commitment.”

Neither White nor Gora responded to phone calls for this story.

Despite the lapsed deadline, White apparently has been working on the issue. Last Thursday he convened a meeting with faculty members who are part of the university’s governance structure to discuss the allegations of racial discrimination.

Because of the paucity of people of color in leadership positions, that body of professors and staff members included just two African Americans, according to eyewitnesses.

It’s not that other people of color were not informed of the meeting. Concerned about the lack of minority voices in the debate a group of students requested permission to sit in on the meeting.

But the presence of six armed state troopers and a locked door to the meeting room in the Healey Library presented a strong deterrent.

“I was upset that they wouldn’t let us in,” said Maria Luisa Plasencia, a UMass junior who heads Casa Latina, a Latino student organization. “We’re the students who are the leaders on campus.”

Faculty and administrators reached by the Banner would not comment on the record for this story, citing fear of retaliation.

“A lot of people have been afraid to talk here,” said one professor. “People who are interested in promoting diversity are the ones who are not being listened to. When they’ve tried to say something, they’ve been rebuffed.”

Other professors say outspoken faculty of color are often punished with cuts to their programs. Non-tenured professors and administrators say they fear being fired.

Of particular concern to Plasencia was the university’s offer to former College of Public and Community Service Dean Ismael Ramirez Soto of a one-year contract with no guarantee of a teaching position at expiration, despite favorable performance reviews and protests of faculty members.

Ramirez Soto, who was coming to the end of a five-year contract, exercised an option in his expiring contract for a tenure-track position, vacating his seat.

His replacement, Connie Chan, has had no administrative experience.

“You replace a powerful minority person with a weak one and say it’s diversity,” said another professor, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

While Ramirez Soto remained at UMass, nine faculty members of color have left the university in the last three years. One, Geography and Earth Sciences Department Professor Zong-Guo Xia, accused the university of ethnic cleansing in an article in UMass Boston’s Mass Media student newspaper last year.

Plasencia says the departures of professors of color are threatening the diversity at UMass.

“They’re not replacing the professors,” she said. “It’s extremely distressing to know we’re losing them.”

Senior Tony Naro said the administration is not listening to the students’ concerns. Carl White’s mostly white meeting, he said, demonstrates a lack of concern.

“How can they gauge the state of UMass Boston without talking to people of color?” he questioned.