I won’t speak ill of the dead but I’m not sure this is such a great idea.

Aaron C. Davis of the Washington Post reported.

Marion Barry University — and free tuition? D.C. lawmaker proposes overhaul of UDC

D.C. Council member Vincent B. Orange on Tuesday proposed turning the University of the District of Columbia into a tuition-free community college and renaming it after the late Marion Barry.

University officials said they had not been consulted on the proposals, and council colleagues offered initial support only for the idea of tuition-free community college — something President Obama last month called for nationwide.

Orange, an at-large Democrat and strong supporter of expanding the District’s struggling university, cast his proposals as a chance to keep more high school students on track to obtaining college degrees and to allow students to do so while remaining in the District instead of traveling elsewhere for costlier options.

He also argued that renaming the university after Barry, a former mayor who was on the D.C. Council at the time of his death, would be a fitting tribute to the city’s most well-known, if polarizing, figure.

“Marion Barry is an individual who should be properly honored, but also should be studied, should be researched, just like you would with [former President] Ronald Reagan or [former President George W.] Bush,” Orange said. “For the District of Columbia, this guy really had a major footprint in the city.”