City Expects Second U.S. Grant

A year ago this week, the Mayor of Cambridge released a letter to the presidents of Harvard and M.I.T. asking their help in solving this City's multiplying housing problems.

Yesterday, Mayor Daniel J. Hayes Jr. said that Cambridge is expected to receive soon the second of two major federal grants, both of which are indirect results of that letter. He indicated also that the City's housing situation is getting better, but that it is far from solved.

The impending grant to Cambridge is a federal "Model Cities" grant, which could supply up to 80 per cent of the City's cost in creating a model neighborhood, presumably in working class, low-income sections of East Cambridge. The Model Cities application, submitted last April, could provide $180,000.

Cambridge has already announced its receipt of a federal Community Development Program Grant, of $261,000, to finance a two-year planning study for City housing, health, welfare, and employment. Hayes had said at the time that Cambridge's shortage of low and middle-income housing would be a special concern of planning under that grant.

Hayes released his letter to President Pusey and Howard Johnson, president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, on Columbus Day, 1966. In it, he made two points

* the great number of temporary residents of Cambridge, most of them related in some way to the two universities, were willing to pay higher rents for apartments here than permanent residents, forcing up rentals for all.

* the City's lack of housing in general, particularly for low-income families was growing critical, a situation that required the advice and cooperation of its two major universities, according to the Mayor.

Hayes said in an interview yesterday that the immediate result of his well-publicized letter was a meeting in his office last Nov. 4 with City Manager Joseph A. DeGuglielmo '29, President Pusey, Johnson, James Killian, chairman of the M.I.T. Corporation, their assistants, and himself.

At that meeting, Hayes said yesterday, the universities agreed to do increased work in developing on-campus housing for their students, particularly for married and graduate students. The last two categories have represented far greater a problem in City housing than the comparatively few undergraduates who live off-campus.

Hayes said he is trying to get Harvard and M.I.T. to keep all their students at least within walking distance of the institutions, and out of areas occupied primarily by long-term Cambridge residents.

The meeting with the presidents was followed by three sessions during November with various Cambridge planning officials, including several representatives of Harvard and M.I.T. at which it was decided to have Cambridge apply for the two federal grants. It was also agreed that the City would hire a man to specialize in seeing its federal grant applications through to completion. Justin M. Gray was hired to fill this post.

Hayes said that the two grants will not solve City housing needs. There are currently 35,000 dwelling units in the City, he said, and planning souces tell him it needs about 10,000 more to fill the need. "10,000 units." Hayes said, from low-income houses to luxury apartments along the river."