An alleged racist with no expertise of fund administration is answerable for the embattled West Harlem Growth Company’s $56 million endowment, The Publish has realized.
Zead Ramadan, 57, managed a restaurant in Higher Manhattan and had a enterprise promoting sandwiches at espresso stations at Columbia College hospitals earlier than being appointed as government director of the WHDC in 2020.
This 12 months, he was accused by one colleague of constructing racist remarks and by two ladies of harassing and verbally abusing them in a federal lawsuit, which WHDC has denied.
As revealed by The Publish, the nonprofit, shaped in 2009, has been accused of mismanagement and squandering “a generational alternative” over the $96 million it has been handed over 15 years by Columbia College to enhance the lives of residents in Manhattanville to account for its campus increasing into the realm.
No main development or long-term initiatives have been began by WHDC. Its belongings have dwindled to only over $56 million, housed in an funding account at First Boston, the place it earns simply over $2 million in curiosity a 12 months, in keeping with the group’s federal filings.
The curiosity quantity is across the similar because the nonprofit awards annually to neighborhood teams — staging a music pageant and shopping for turkeys for native residents at Thanksgiving, amongst different actions — which implies the pot isn’t rising.
In accordance with its 2024 federal tax filings, WHDC shelled out $173,000 in “funding administration charges,” over the earlier 12 months.
Though the precise phrases of how the fund can be utilized haven’t been disclosed, if WHDC had invested even simply its preliminary verify for $17 million from the college right into a inventory market tracker and left it, then it might be price some $205 million immediately, in keeping with trackerin2013dollars.com
Ramadan, who was already on the board of WHDC, was appointed its government director in 2020, after what board members instructed The Publish was an “exhaustive” cross-country search, using a advisor at greater than $150,000.
Ramadan is one among few salaried employees on the WHDS, incomes $147,000 throughout his first 12 months as government director in 2021. His wage has since grown to greater than $225,000 in 2024, a 53 % improve, in keeping with tax filings.
“When it got here all the way down to it, Ramadan was a wide selection and the one candidate who actually knew Harlem as a result of he has labored so lengthy locally,” a present WHDC board member and neighborhood activist instructed The Publish.
However not everybody appeared to share that optimism. One board member, who headed up the search committee, resigned instantly after fellow board members and chair Milton Tingling, the highly effective New York County Clerk, backed Ramadan for the place, in keeping with sources.
Ramadan and WHDC didn’t return requests for remark Monday.
Earlier than becoming a member of the board of the WHDC, Ramadan already had shut ties to Columbia College and Higher Manhattan neighborhood.
He had been a member of Manhattan’s Group Board 12 in Harlem for 15 years, in keeping with a web based bio. His spouse, Rudina Odeh Ramadan, is vice dean for finance and administration at Columbia.
Ramadan — additionally a member of the Council on American and Islamic Relations (CAIR) in New York — was additionally a founding board member of a Harlem memorial middle for Malcolm X the place he operated the X Cafe on the Malcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazz Memorial and Schooling Middle, based in 2005.
Ramadan additionally ran in a Democratic main for a Metropolis Council seat in 2013 in District 7, which represents Washington Heights, Manhattanville and Hudson Heights. He obtained 3.6 % of the vote, ending in seventh place. Present New York Metropolis Comptroller Mark Levine gained the race.
Born to Palestinian mother and father, Ramadan moved together with his household to Washington Heights from Kuwait in 1971 and lived in a three-bedroom residence together with his mother and father and 7 brothers and sisters.
Each of his mother and father have been illiterate, he instructed the Columbia scholar newspaper, and his father labored 18-hour days as a baker on 164th Avenue to assist the household.
Final 12 months, former WHDC board member and worker Vincent Morgan filed a federal swimsuit in opposition to WHDC, alleging that Ramadan made antisemitic and racist statements and harassed fellow staff.
Morgan complained to Tingling, the board chair, who dropped the ball, the grievance fees, saying he refused to intervene even after three staff of WHDC complained about Ramadan’s alleged racism.
Court docket recordsdata additionally reveal allegations that Ramadan harassed and verbally abused a number of the ladies within the workplace. A longtime feminine worker requested to alter workplaces with a purpose to transfer away from Ramadan’s alleged bullying. One other lady, who was pregnant, was fired after she complained about Ramadan’s alleged harassment in 2025, court docket papers say.
“Sadly this isn’t the primary occasion of inappropriate or hostile communication I’ve skilled from Zead,” wrote the accuser, who was a Particular Tasks Coordinator at WHDC, in an electronic mail to board vice chair Armond Adams final 12 months.
“Over the previous a number of months his tone and language have persistently been unprofessional, creating a piece surroundings that feels unsafe, tense and emotionally exhausting.”
WHDC has beforehand denied all of the allegations introduced within the federal court docket submitting, however the case continues.
