Nixon Cutbacks Could Threaten Harvard Plans

Cutbacks in Federal housing grants by the Nixon Administration have jeopardized the plans for two Harvard housing programs and indirectly threaten to force the University to discontinue subsidies for community housing.

Hale Champion, financial vice president for the University, said yesterday that the funding base for a current housing project at the Medical School and a long-term proposal for married students' housing are threatened by the government cutbacks.

Plans to renovate buildings at the Med School as well as subsidies to the Cambridge Corporation for low and moderate income housing projects may have to be scratched, Champion said. Undergraduate housing plans will not be affected, he said.

The Med School apartment project will give priority to community residents, but some Med School students will inhabit the building. Champion said that no decision has been made on the project's future, but added that previously-committed funds hopefully would keep the project alive.

Higher Rents

The married housing plans call for a 3-per-cent interest subsidy by the government. Champion said that if the project is carried through, the cutback will result in raised rents for the graduate students who occupy the complex.

Oliver Brooks, director of the Cambridge Corporation, said yesterday that he expects the Federal fund cutbacks to cause Harvard and MIT to discontinue their aid to the Corporation's community housing projects.

Brooks said that the Corporation, a development firm for city housing, will lose an inestimable amount of direct subsidies from the government.

The Cambridge Corporation now has no existing plans that depend on uncommitted Federal funds, because they closed an agreement with the government for a 116 unit development complex in Inman Square one week before the moratorium on Federal aid.

"It is quite clear that any organization involved in urban problem-solving is under severe threat, considering the whole implications of the housing moratorium and budget cuts," Brooks said.

Last year's renovation of the Continental Hotel was Harvard's first use of Federal funds for housing. Champion said the interest subsidy that Harvard received will save the University about $1 million in deferred costs over a 30 year period.