Upstart Alumni Propose Overseer

A group of young Harvard graduates, charging Harvard with unresponsiveness toward the Cambridge community, has nominated former OEO director Terry F. Lenzner '61 as a candidate for the Board of Overseers.

The upstart group of Harvard graduates, called the Committee of Concerned Alumni, said that Lenzner's election would insure representation of a younger, less traditional constituency.

"Harvard needs to act more fully as a moral leader and must have a more responsive attitude in its outside dealings than it has in the past," said Brett Donham '60, the committee spokesman.

Lenzner, 31, is a lawyer who has worked in the Civil Rights division of the Justice Department, for the N. Y. Board of Education, and for the OEO Legal Services where he was national director for 18 months.

"Lenzner couples the virtues of working within the system while working for social change," Donham said. "He has devoted his life to defending the poor, preserving essential civil liberties, and making basic changes in the public interest."

Twelve "official" candidates have also been nominated by the 72-member Board of Directors of the Association of Harvard Alumni.

Five Overseers are elected every year for six-year terms. Because of the un-expired term of a recently deceased Overseer, six places are currently vacant on the 30-member board.

Gentlemen

Two hundred signatures on a petition qualify any alumnus as a nominee. According to Donham, such nominations rarely occur and are considered "ungentlemanly, blatant and aggressive, and generally not in the Harvard tradition."

As soon as the signatures on the petition are certified, Lenzner's name will be added to the ballot. On April 15, ballots will be mailed to the 130,000 Harvard alumni. The six nominees receiving the highest number of votes will become Overseers.

Origins

The Committee of Concerned Alumni grew out of the Class of 1960's tenth reunion last June. The 25-member group's first project was to protest the Corporation's decision last spring to vote with the General Motors management against public interest reforms sponsored by consumer advocate Ralph Nader.