Word: hre
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Since its inception HTU has warned that HRE officials have fallen out of touch with tenants' day-to-day concerns. Only recently, one main source of HRE's lack of understanding became apparent. Top HRE administrators received pay hikes last year of up to $17,000 each--increases larger than the total salaries of many Harvard tenants. HRE President Sally Zeckhauser now earns more than $65,000 annually, and her assistants, Vice President Robert Silverman and Treasurer S. Michael Hawe, each take home more than $49,000. While tenants called the hikes "astounding" and expressed resentment that Harvard finds money...
...tenants' union has had limited success in representing residents of University apartments. With about 40 highly active members and several hundred who have indicated some support. HTU has managed to foster a greater awareness of tenants' rights. The key stumbling block to further progress has been HRE's staunch refusal to recognize the union as legitimate representative of even some of its tenants. In a recent letter to HTU Coordinator Michael Turk. Zeckhauser stated that "it is the policy of Harvard Real Estate. Inc to respond to specific complaints and suggestions from specific tenants about their individual units and building...
...HRE "hopes that we go away," Turk says. Just to make sure, HRE is trying to hasten the union's departure--a signal that perhaps HTU is beginning to have some small effect on Harvard's decision-making process. HRE has sent an employee to spy on a tenants' meeting, threatened at least one HTU activist with eviction, and broken out the heavy legal artillery to fight tenants at 8 Plympton St. who have been receiving assistance from Turk. At a recent rent control board meeting, HRE attorney Daniel Polvere filed an abnormally long--20 page--brief for Harvard...
...ATHOUGH HRE seems to be employing classic anti-union strategies, Harvard has also shown that it can be pressured into dealing with more than one "specific tenant" at a time. At the Craigie Arms apartments where HTU members have also played a leading role, the University has for more than two months been negotiating with about two dozen residents fighting HRE's attempt to convert the building into luxury housing. In return for moving out, the Craigie tenants are seeking future guarantees about Harvard's commitment to low and moderate-income housing. Apparently Harvard's "policy" of ignoring tenant groups...
...members have been totally foreclosed from offering constructive suggestions to HRE administrators. The most blatant instance of disregard for tenants' efforts to contribute to the improvement of their homes came last May, when HTU released the results of a comprehensive energy-use survey of Harvard-owned buildings. Designed to identify inexpensive means of reducing energy waste, the survey was never formally acknowledged by Harvard. It is fairly easy to understand why HRE administrators would resent off-the-cuff tenant gripes, but it is far more difficult to explain how HRE could close its eyes to a well-researched and carefully...