High Court Upholds City Removal Ordinance

The United States Supreme Court last week refused to consider a challenge to a city ordinance that limits reductions in Cambridge's low and moderate-income housing stock.

The case, Fresh Pond Shopping Center, Inc. vs. the Rent Control Board of Cambridge, was dismissed last Tuesday by a vote of 8-1 "for want of a substantial federal question." Justice William H. Rehnquist dissented.

But by dismissing the case, the court reaffirmed the constitutionality of the rent board's action denying the local shopping complex a permit to remove six rent-controlled apartments from the city's tight housing market by demolishing the building.

In 1979, the shopping center bought a rent-controlled building located on property it already owned. Officials of the shopping center planned to demolish the building to provide a parking lot for customers at Sears, one of the businesses in the center.

The plans were halted when the rent board refused to grant the center the special removal permit it needed to take the six apartments off the market, a power granted to the five-member board by a 1979 ordinance, and the center took the city to court.

City Councilor David E. Sullivan, who wrote the removal statute, yesterday called the case "nationally significant," and said it was "a substantial victory not only for Cambridge tenants, but for tenants throughout the nation."

Sullivan added, "I hope now local businesses cease their legal attacks [on the ordinance] and save the city some money."

Shopping center officials were unavailable for comment yesterday.