City Groups Plan Urban Renewal

A city-wide ad hoc committee to study recreational facilities and a smaller group studying community organization as it relates to urban renewal may provide the catalyst for redevelopment in Cambridge.

Presently composed of 35 members, representing almost every interest group in Cambridge, the first will aim primarily at enlisting neighborhood aid in a study of the city's recreational facilities in both satisfactory and "renewal" areas.

The second, which includes spokesmen from the Redevelopment Authority, Cambridge Community Services, and the Citizens Advisory Committee, will attempt to map a plan for redevelopment action along neighborhood lines.

According to Russell Smith, executive director of the CAC, both movements represent an attempt to effect action through "grass roots participation." "Recreation is a common denominator," Smith declared. Organizing people in development of recreational facilities might unite them for further action in rehabilitation and redevelopment of rundown neighborhoods.

Smith said that the recreation committee will meet March 21 at Morse School with representatives of the National Recreation Association to discuss hiring a professional consultant to direct the study.

"There is a general feeling that funds are available for this sort of thing," Smith observed. "But there is no definite decision as to what would be done."

He went on to cite the failure of Mary Small, a consultant on city planning, who came up from New Haven several years ago to help organise neighborhood participation.