Harvard Proceeds With Disputed Housing Plan

Harvard will sell another rentcontrolled house as part of a plan to help faculty locate closer to the core campus one week before Cambridge residents voice their opinion on the controversial housing policy.

The University notified interested senior faculty members carlier this week that Harvard would sell the $280,000 house located at 10 Howland St. in the Agassiz neighborhood, said Sally H. Zeckhauser, the president of Harvard Real Estate (HRE) Inc.

On election day, Cantabrigians will vote on a non-binding referendum which would petition the state to prevent further sales from taking place. Harvard officials say the ballot question is biased and not worthy of a referendum.

Property Divestment

For the past two years, HRE, the University's property management firm, has been quietly divesting its small building stock in Cambridge, selling off about 30 buildings not "essential to long term needs."

When a vacancy occurs in a small, wood-framed building owned by the University, HRE has given junior and senior faculty members preference in purchasing the house. If after four weeks, no professor makes a bid, the house is offered to tenants and then placed on the open market.

But local activists charge Harvard with taking advantage of loopholes in Cambridge rent control laws, forcing low-and moderate-income tenants protected by rent control to seek housing elsewhere.

"Our feeling is that the policy still makes sense," Zeckhauser said Wednesday, adding that the University wants to keep a lowprofile in surrounding neighborhoods.

Susan Fletcher, who still lives with her daughter in the rent-controlled house, said she probably could not afford to purchase her dwelling and will begin looking for other housing in the area.

"It seems pretty clear to me that we'd be evicted shortly after the sale" because a buyer would want both floors in the two-story house, Fletcher said.

Under Cambridge's complicated rent control laws, a purchaser can remove his property from the city's stringent housing regulations by occupying his rent controlled unit.

Harvard officials have said that they are not directly displacing tenants through these faculty sales and that they will not help relocate tenants except those who qualify for state housing aid.

"I have a real stake in remaining in Cambridge," Fletcher said, adding that her daughter has been in the city school system for 10 years.

"Harvard should have some responsibilities if we're forced to relocate," she added.