More than 60 neighbors and alumni of the former Harriet Tubman High School in Columbia packed a nearby church last night to say - almost unanimously - that their symbol of segregation and community history should not be transformed into a crisis support center.

For months, a coalition of nonprofit groups has been frustrated in its attempts to find suitable space under one roof to serve battered women, victims of sexual assault and people in need of shelter. Proposals to open such a facility in three other sites - in Ellicott City, Long Reach and Kings Contrivance - were fiercely opposed by the surrounding communities.

This time, the dominating factor was not a concern for safety - although some residents had serious worries - but the site itself. The 54-year-old school, the first in Howard County to offer 12th grade for African-American students, is the only black high school standing.

The campus, near U.S. 29 and Route 32, closed in 1965 with the advent of integration.

From the full pews of Locust United Methodist Church, the congregation of which dates from the 1870s, alumni and community leaders stood last night to deliver their message.

"You must understand that Harriet Tubman School is sacred to us; it's sacred to the black community," said Harts M. Brown, presiding elder of The Council of Elders of The Black Community of Howard County. "It's part of our history."

Cooksville resident Jeanne Randall, who in 1951 was in the school's first graduating class, said residents and groups have applied repeatedly to get the building for use as a community center. Neighborhood children and senior citizens need a place to go, she said.

Lynne Nemeth, a project manager for the coalition, said the nonprofit groups were directed to consider the Tubman site by County Executive James N. Robey and were not aware until recently that people have other plans for the school.

She said the coalition would be happy to share space and is talking to the Howard County Center of African-American Culture - which has long hoped to move into the Tubman campus from its leased rooms in Town Center.

'No room - no room'

But Ken Jennings, a member of the local alumni chapter of the Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, said his group and many others have longed to bring their youth programs to the Tubman school.

"There is no room - no room - at the site for the proposed crisis center," he said.

Sherman Howell of the African American Coalition of Howard County suggested that the former Gateway School in River Hill be sold and the proceeds used to build the center at the new county government campus in Ellicott City.

School system maintenance workers and Head Start classes now operate in the Harriet Tubman main building. A smaller building next door is used by Grassroots Crisis Intervention Center, one of three nonprofit groups hoping to join forces under the same roof to create a larger 24-hour crisis center.

Nemeth said Grassroots hopes to share space with the Domestic Violence Center and the STTAR Center for victims of sexual assault to cut costs and permit the groups to help more people.

'Depth of sentiment'

After angry confrontations at meetings about the other possible sites, coalition leaders had hoped for a better result by holding small neighborhood meetings to discuss options at the Tubman school. But with last night's meeting, the only one scheduled, neighbors as well as congregants streamed in.

The assembly was intensely emotional but rarely heated. The Rev. Victor E. Sawyer, Locust's pastor for 12 years, capped it with a prayer to thank Grassroots for its good work in the neighborhood and fervently hoped the coalition can find the space it needs - elsewhere.

"We want to direct County Executive Jim Robey that the center cannot be accommodated at the Harriet Tubman High School," he said.

Afterward, Nemeth said the coalition hopes to continue conversations with the African-American community.

"One of the things we learned tonight was the depth of the sentiment for the history of this school," she said.