Harvard Will Seek Permit For Sumner Rd. Eviction

Harvard lawyers will ask the city's Rent Board for a removal permit within the next two weeks, a new tack in Harvard's 15-month-old attempt to evict tenants from 7 Sumner Rd. and use the building for Graduate School of Design office space.

The removal permit is required under a city ordinance passed last summer to prevent the city's housing shortage from worsening.

Under the law, developers need city permission before evicting tenants from rent-controlled units.

Objections

Sally Zeckhauser, president of Harvard Real Estate Inc., said yesterday University lawyers will argue that Harvard's intention to convert the four-story brick apartment to office space was clear before the ordinance was passed.

Harvard will also point out that the ordinance was originally designed to prevent condominium conversions, not renovation for office space, Zeckhauser said.

"We'd like to work within the process; we don't see any reason we can't" Zeckhauser added.

Tenants remaining in the building will fight the eviction attempt as they have fought similar moves in the past, Donald Cohen, a resident of the building, said yesterday.

Five of the 16 units are still occupied, but one tenant is planning to move out, Cohen said.

"Our attorney feels we can fight the University on a number of grounds," Cohen said, adding, "We've only really gotten a ruling on one of them so far."

The Rent Board refused to allow the University to evict tenants last year, ruling some tenants' leases were still valid. Harvard has been appealing that decision in District Court.

Of the nearly deserted apartment building. Cohen said, "This is beginning to look a little like an office building. It's kind of nice, though--there's no tenant noise or anything."