A 'Stumbling,' 'Mumbling,' 'Kangaroo Court': The Cambridge Rent Control Board

David Sullivan and William Walsh don't agree on much of anything concerning Cambridge city politics. In fact, the two men have become symbolic of the diametrically opposed poles of opinion that now dominate debates over the honest political issue in the city: housing policy. But City Councilor Sullivan, a leading member of the liberal Cambridge Civic Association, and attorney Walsh, who claims to have represented 1000 or more landlords during the last 13 years, probably come closest to agreeing when they talk about the procedures of the Cambridge Rent Control Board, a quasi-judicial agency which administers many of the city's housing codes, including the controversial restraints on landlords that Sullivan supports and Walsh opposes in equally strident tones. Sullivan calls some of the board's methods "fundamentally unfair," and Walsh labels the rent board a "kangaroo court."

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In two small rectangular hearing rooms on the second floor of a Central Square office building, the five-man rent control board conducts its weekly Wednesday night meetings. Two members represent the city's landlords, two represent tenants, the chairman speaks for homeowners, and all serve voluntarily at the pleasure of the city manager, who appointed them.

A long rectangular table stands at the front of the main hearing room and about 10 rows of folding chairs are arranged for the tenants, landlords, and attorneys who are scheduled to appear. At any given time on a Wednesday night those chairs are nearly full because the board almost always falls significantly behind schedule. Due to the annoying waiting period in the unusally stuffy concrete chamber where the final stage of the rent control hearing process is held, and the often months-long wait that preceded it, landlords' and tenants' tempers sometimes grow short by the time they face the board members. To end a repetitious argument or enforce quiet among the audience. Chairman Acheson Callaghan picks up his gavel and taps it with the authority of an annoyed judge. "It's not a court," says one resident familiar with the board's procedures. "But there's a lot on the line so already you're uncomfortable as a tenant."

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Rent control was created more than a decade ago by a majority of the city council and special Massachusetts legislation to enable Cambridge to cope with an "emergency" housing shortage. A city ordinance instructs the rent board to set maximum legal rents for the thousands of apartments falling under rent control and to restrain the eviction of tenants by landlords. The rent board is also empowered to make rent adjustments and to establish regulations or to take other steps necessary to enforce the city's housing policy, which has been amended since the early 1970s to add further restrictions on landlords, developers and would be residents of condominiums in Cambridge.

More important than the technicalities of the rent control board regulations, however, are the political realities which supply the context for the rent board's decisions. Although the city council recently approved unanimously a symbolic resolution to show its continued support of rent control, four of the nine council members--known as Independents--repeatedly support resolutions that would hamper the enforcement of the city's housing policy by, among other methods, denying the board adequate funding to defend its decisions in court. Since any rent board decision may be appealed to district court, this threat, along with other political ploys, help to push the board away from a strictly judicial function. The other factors that significantly damage the credibility of the agency's decision-making process are the attitudes of the board members themselves, who are harshly criticised both by liberals such as Sullivan and conservatives such as Walsh.

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During the winter months of 1981, members of the Harvard Tenants Union (HTU) spent hundreds of hours compiling an energy usage survey of tenants in Harvard-owned buildings. But because Harvard does not recognize the existence of the tenants' union, the results of the survey were never used by the administrators who oversee the University's residential properties, which comprise the largest single portfolio owned by any Cambridge landlord. Members of the union were nevertheless determined that the survey findings, which they said demonstrated a "gross form of mismanagement" by Harvard Real Estate (HRE), be considered. The tenants have an economic interest in keeping down fuel costs because under rent control board regulations landlords may pass energy costs on to residents in the form of higher rents.

After learning that the rent board had embarked on its own program of encouraging landlords to conserve energy members of the tenant's union decided to take their survey results to the board. HRE officials in fact encourage members of the union to seek redress for any grievances against Harvard at the rent board or in court. So HTU Coordinator Michael Turk went to the board to present the survey findings on May 13, along with a half-dozen or so union members.

Turk made a short speech and offered documentation of the study's conclusions, which were based on responses from tenants of 174 Harvard-owned apartments. There followed a short discussion among rent board members, which was dominated by Landlord representative Alfred Cohn. "There are a lot of Harvard buildings on the high end" of energy usage among city properties. Cohn admitted. But he added, leaning back in his chair. "Harvard is now pursuing the problem vigorously and we expect them to soon move past other buildings in the city" in terms of energy efficiency.

Cohn then made a statement which union members said afterwards had shocked and disappointed them. "I would think you are in an extraordinarily favorable situation and would stay a Harvard tenant." Cohn told the residents who had invested long hours uncovering what they believed to be HRE's massive wastefulness.

Cohn explained that Harvard is one of the few Cambridge landlords that can afford the major expenditures needed to reduce fuel consumption. Turk responded that "major renovations" would mean increased rents and that Harvard could cut fuel costs simply by eliminating waste, performing routine maintenance, and obtaining quantity discounts on fuel. These measures, Turk said, had been indicated by the HTU survey and were likely to generatelower rents for Harvard tenants. But Cohn, himself a landlord and the only rent board member to serve since the agency's inception, was not convinced.

Rubbing his eyes and leaning away from the audience of University tenants. Cohn repeated that as occupants of Harvard housing. "You should consider yourselves very fortunate."

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Michael Turk has served for more than a year as the "coordinator" of the Harvard Tenants Union, a fledgling group of tenant activists who came together in 1981 to oppose what they consider "heavy-handed" treatment by their landlord. Harvard University.

"Most people are shocked by their first experience at the rent control board," he says. "They go in expecting, because it is the rent control board, if not outright advocacy, then at least tenant protection. But they find it' not even that, even though that's their [the rent board's] mandate."

"The first thing you have to deal with is the actual dynamics of the board. A lot of tenants complain about the fundamental rudeness of the board. It has its own procedures for operating, and they're not made evident to anyone present, you might even say they're obscured. A lot of people talk about how tense they are when they go in there. The cues--when to talk, etc., are left out. You're made to feel as if your complaints aren't legitimate."

Because the rent board maintains no systematic record of case precedent. Cohn, the only member who has served since the beginning of rent control, "is the repository of a lot of information on how the board works." "It falls to Cohn to say, 'Oh, yeah. I remember that,'" Turk explains. "His memory can be selective and it gives him even more power. There should be some way of allowing some one who's fresh to know what's going on."

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William Cavellini has been active in rent board cases for about eight years. Although he does not hold a law degree. Cavellini has spent most of his time before the board as an advocate for other tenants.

Even at meetings chaired by past rent board chairman. "The atmosphere was never cordial," Cavellini says. But there were other chairmen Callaghan and who had "less of a short face." With previous chairmen, Cavellini says that both tenant and landlords "got more respect." "There is a certain impatience," he says of Callaghan, pausing to explain that he "doesn't want to make any personal attacks." But he says. "The chairman sets a tone." "Previous boards have been more courteous and treated both adversial parties with move respect."

Cavellini says that especially when the board decides a case by consensus, "a lot of times the tenants and landlords have to ask what happened." "When you do things by mumbling," he says, "a lot of people don't know what's happening." "It's an argument in almost any activity in our society that being more open and more accessible is being more equitable and tairer."

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Lynn Weissberg acts as chairperson of the legal committee of one of the city's largest tenant lobbying groups and frequently appears before the rent board on behalf of residents. She also maintains a private law practice and attends rent board proceedings with her tenant clients.

"I understand they [rent board members] serve without pay, but that's no excuse for rudeness. There's no other way to describe it. Most of them make no effort to explain to the parties what's going on "Weissberg explains that because of the lack of a volume of case precedents "for someone in there [at the rent board] for the first time there is no way to get a handle on it. It's not unusual for Fred Cohn to lean back and recall" precedents she says, adding that his status as the most senior board member "puts the parties at an incredible disadvantage. There's no way I can say. 'No, that's not true.'"

Chairman Callaghan also "wields too much power" over other board members, Weissberg says. "The chairman is the only lawyer member, and he's looked to so that the decision is basically his, especially if it centers on a legal issue where the others feel incompetent." She adds that "apart from the merits, the chairman lacks common courtesy I find that intolerable."

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Daniel Polvere serves as chief counsel for Harvard Real Estate and appears in that capacity before the rent board almost every month. Since being hired by Harvard in 1978. Polvere has become one of the attorneys best known to rent board members.

"Everyone I talk to says it [the rent board] is a biased board. The thing is I suppose it does have to do with what you think it's supposed to do." According to Polvere, the rent board" by its nature is a status quo agency it keeps the lid on rents" and trys to prevent the depletion of the housing stock, he says. "It's essentially a conservative--not in the political sense--agency."

"I am to this day unable to understand the reason for the heat and adjutation [that occurs] in some rent board cases."

He states that he is unaware that some tenants perceive that rent board members generally accord him a warmer reception that other, less experienced attorneys and most tenants. But he offers a possible explanation. "When I'm appearing before the board. I try to be courteous, which by the way is not a common virtue [among the parties] in there. A lot of people well at them [members of the rent board]."

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William Walsh is one of the city's most outspoken critics of rent control and codes prohibiting the conversion of rent controlled apartments to condominiums.

Although Walsh says rent board members are "extremely rude" to landlords and tenants, he contends that the major problem with the rent board is the members "political leanings. "Cohn" wants to make sure the CCA stays in effective control of the rent board "in order to perpetuate things." Walsh says, adding that neither the landlord nor tenant representatives are typical of the groups they serve. According to Walsh Cohn does not under stand the average landlord. He's a dreamer in a world where reality" outweighs any respect for theory. And Walsh says that if you tell me Joel Johnson [a tenant representative] is an average tenant, then it's time I move out of Cambridge. You're not putting typical people on the board, so you're not getting typical answers.

Despite the many hours he has spent in front of the rent board. Walsh says he has discovered no successful formula for dealing with the board members. "What strategy could you use' You've prepared your client psychologically as well as legally for what will happen. But there's nothing you can do except tell him that it's a kangaroo court and push and push and push to get your point of view across to board members.

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Joel Johnson has served as one of the rent board's two tenant representative since May of 1981.

"If you've been there [at rent board meetings], you may understand the delicate relations of members of the board. Sometimes it's like a tug of war," he says. "I realize that sometimes it looks like we're stumbling or mumbling in our beard. But tenants come in and only see one case when we could have 20 that night and be there til three in the morning. We have to dispense with cases in a manner that is most comfortable for us."

"The parties before us should be given a better idea of how we're voting," he says. "The problem is that voting is done in a very informal way. But it we tried to formalize our procedure, then the parties would be expected to be more formal, too."

"I think that tenants probably have some misconceptions about rent control," Johnson says. "They think they may not be very secure, but a lot have forgotten or never experienced what it would be like living in a city without rent control." The fact that some tenants see rent control as an absolute ceiling on rents causes problems, he says. In addition, some tenants become uncomfortable at rent board meetings because they "haven't learned yet how to approach the board." "When I went before the board as a tenant. I was not sure what to do," he admits. But after appearing there many times. "I finally figured out" how the board works, he says.

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Alfred Cohn sits in a unique position on the rent board as the only member who has served since the agency's creation.

"The questions the board deals with should be no surprise." Cohn says in answer to a question about tenants' confusion at board meetings. "There really are no surprise, if a tenant is paying attention, he will understand procedures." But only a few minutes later Cohn says. "It we can be faulted, it is because we sometimes do not give a layman's explanation" of the reasoning behind decisions. "Somebody who hasn't been there [at the rent board] before or doesn't understand the issues might be surprised, but then it's the job of those with experience to explain what's going on."

Cohn says he doubts that the lack of a record of case precedent is a handicap for landlords, tenants, or other board members. "I don't think I've ever flim-flammed anyone" with a recollection of precedent or through one of technical expense, Cohn says. He does admit, however, that the board's handbook of procedural and substantive regulations causes confusion. "These is one puzzle," he says. "If you try to real the board's regulations, you can't figure out what's going on. But Cohn says he does not favor a less complicated, more descriptive version of the board's regulations. "If you start to write descriptions we would find people saying. It seems what you're doing is inconsistent with your regulations.

Denying that the board members are hostile" to anyone who appears at meetings, Cohn says. "I think that's simply a misunderstanding."

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On a council sharply divided over housing policy. David Sullivan is consistently the strongest supporter of Cambridge's tough codes on landlords and developers.

"No member of the rent board has ever been removed" by a city manager, Sullivan says. "It's as if they were appointed for life Noting--that Cohn has served more than 10 years. Sullivan says that Cohn's seniority "creates tremendous problems because that precedent is not written down anywhere. It's an amazing situation" that is fundamentally unfair" to those with little or no rent control experience, he says.

"Some members of the current board--at least one--don't get along very well with people," he adds. "There are both personality and political problems at the rent board, Sullivan says. "Some are personal, but they're mostly institutional, and thus at base political. If it [rent control] works, some special interests might get hurt too much."

The rent board's mission is to protect tenants but the current board--at least some members--loses sight of that fact." Part of the reason the rent board has swayed from its purpose stems from persistent political opposition to rent control across the city and within the city council, he explains. "Historically the city manager [who appoints rent board members] has taken the easy way out" of the political bechive of housing debates by supporting "a non-mission for the rent board," according to Sullivan.

He concludes that what is really needed to improve rent board management and procedures "is an aggressive rent board appointed by" the city manager. But Sullivan says the last and current city managers' administration "has been unwilling to make the necessary changes."

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Since taking over Cambridge's top administrative post last summer. City Manager Robert Healy has watched the council walk a tightrope in support of housing codes.

Healy says that he has received "only one" complaint about "rudeness" on the part of rent board members in meetings. "The majority of the complaints. I've received are about the length of time it takes for a rent adjustment."

But Healy says he is "constantly prepared to review the administration and composition of the rent board." The members face "difficult issues under hostile conditions created by the length of time that is required to complete the procedure," Healy says. "Whoever the petitioning party is, then fuse is likely to be a little short from the delay by the time they reach the board."

"There are always personality clashes in a quasi-judicial agency like the rent board," he says. "When you do not get what you want, arguments are inevitable. "But Healy stresses that "if there are any problems with the actions of the board. I have no difficulty in reviewing the membership." He says he is aware that some members of the current board--especially Alfred Cohn--may have an unfair advantage because of their seniority. "Should we replace him [Cohn?]" Healy asks, and then responds to his own question, saying. "I don't think that he's performing poorly. He may be an asset because of his expertise."

"I've never been to a rent board meetings" Healy says. "Maybe I should attend one."

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Acheson Callaghan declined to return phone calls to his office.