The Audubon Ballroom had fallen into disrepair after the 1965 assassination of Malcolm X, and by the mid-1970s it had become the property of New York City. In the early 1980s,
Columbia University proposed the construction of a modern
biotechnology center on the site, a plan that later grew to include a
research park. After community protests and legal attempts by
preservationists to save the building, Columbia sought Betty Shabazz's approval for the project. She appealed for the preservation of the ballroom where her husband had been shot, and a compromise was worked out which allowed the building of the biotechnology center, but also preserved and restored the facade of the Audubon Ballroom building, which would be developed into a museum. Plans for the site briefly stalled after Shabazz's death in 1997, but the scope of the center was expanded and it eventually was completed although it struggled in its early years. The daughters of Malcolm and Betty Shabazz continue the family's advocacy work through the museum. ==References==