Council Hits Harvard's City Role, Passes Record Cambridge Budget

The Cambridge City Council passed a record $32,233,979.03 budget last night, but not before delivering a brutal attack on "the relentless takeover by Harvard University" of city institutions.

The attack on Harvard, specifically on the Med School's affiliation with the Cambridge City Hospital, was delivered by Councilor Thomas W. Danehy. Danehy charged that several of his constituents had been refused service in the hospital because they were not suitable teaching cases.

Danehy further charged that an unnamed doctor "from Mexico or South America" was responsible. If the incident occured again, Danehy said, "I'm personally going down there and give him a kick in the duff, and maybe some anatomy professor can tell him where the duffis."

The record budget, which might raise the property tax rate as much as eight dollars, included a $600,000 jump in expenses for the city hospital. Much of this increase represents raises in salaries for the hospital employees.

Danehy expressed concern that the hospital's affiliation with the Med School came at the expense of the citizens of Cambridge. He did not, however propose a cut in the appropriation.

The increases in the appropriation for the hospital were partially balanced by cuts in the money allocated to street and sewer repairs and to the Cambridge Recreation Department. Daniel J. Hayes Jr. attacked the cuts in the appropriation for sewers in light of the recent floods. Hayes was the only councilor who did not vote for the budget.

Vellucci Scores

Councilor Alfred E. Vellucci also criticized the cuts in money for sewers and claimed that he had personally discovered several fake sewers in Cambridge. One of these, at Third and Otis Streets, was merely a grating set in the pavement with no drainage area below, according to Vellucci.

Presiding in the temporary absence of Mayor Walter J. Sullivan, Vellucci introduced a resolution ordering that the names of Lyndon B. Johnson, Robert F. Kennedy '48, Eugene J. McCarthy and Richard M. Nixon be placed on the April 30th primary ballot.

Somehow failing to hear the objections raised, Vellucci declared that his motion was passed unanimously.

Since the election is a state election, the motion of the City Council is irrelevant, but this did not seem to bother Vellucci.