Vellucci Inquires About Harvard's Payments to City

With the Cambridge elections less than a week away, City Councillor Alfred E. Vellucci last night decided to take a few pot-shots at one of his tried-and-true targets-Harvard University.

At yesterday's City Council meeting, Vellucci introduced a resolution asking the Board of Assessors to compile a list of all the properties-tax-exempt and tax-paying-which Harvard owns in Cambridge, and to total up the amount of taxes and in-lien-of-tax payments the University pays to the City. The council unanimously passed the resolution after Vellucci amended it to include M.I.T. and Radcliffe.

"You'd open your eyes; you'd think it [Harvard payments to the City] would run into hundreds of thousands of dollars-which it doesn't," Vellucci said in introducing the resolution.

[A fact sheet released last year by Harvard stated that, in 1967, the University paid $586.978 to Cambridge. The total for Harvard, Radcliffe, and M.I.T. taxes in the City was $1,927,000.]

The East Cambridge Councillor also indicated he would invite-subpoena if legally possible-the Harvard Corporation and Board of Overseers to attend a council meeting for discussion of the matter. "You know. I've never seen them," Vellucci said. "I'd like to see what they look like."