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Ballot Initiative Abolishes Rent Control

Cambridge Officials Vow to Preserve Some Semblance of Rent Limits in City

Despite its lack of funds, the fledgling group will remain a political force and take the issue to the state legislature or the courts, Lee said.

"We'll come up with a plan to eradicate our debt," said Lee, who has lived in a rent control apartment in Cambridge for 10 years. "We're not going to be the beneficiaries of any large contributions, but we'll continue to get nickels and dimes, like we have during this campaign. We'll get through."

It's questionable how successful the group will be in the courts. Proponents of rent control brought Question 9 before the state's Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) this summer, charging that the ballot question violated the autonomy of local communities. But the SJC ruled that the question was constitutional and ordered that it remain on the referendum.

The campaign chair charged that Question 9 was unfairly influenced by the national real estate lobby. The Greater Boston Real Estate Board, for instance, granted MHC a $75000 loan.

"All they had to do was call up their buddies in the real-estate industry to get their money," Lee said. "The real estate industry has stirred up a hornet's nest. Their greed and selfishness really blinded them to what they were doing."

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The fate of SOCC will be decided by its steering committee in a meeting tonight.

"I know they'll vote to continue as a political-action group," Lee said. "The question is how to form ourselves into a lobbying group."

Slavery Comparison

Schloming, the SPOA board member, rejected the home-rule objection of rent control supporters. She compared rent control to slavery in the American South.

"A majority of states in the south wanted slavery, wanted home rule," said Schloming, who has owned a house in Cambridge for 10 years. "But the majority of the country as a whole said, 'No, we're not going to have a country like that. The federal law takes precedent over the states.' The same thing with the landlord-tenant law."

She repeated landlord's assertions that rent control is unfairly restrictive.

"We just feel oppressed by all the regulations, all the red tape. The money is not the big thing; it's all that bureaucracy," Schloming said. "It's a real yoke of oppression."

But Reeves, who occupies a rent-control apartment on Everett Street, said Question 9 will displace elderly tenants.

"We're going to have a lot of people ending up living in Brockton because they won't be able to live here," Reeves said.

The mayor said the real estate market will be inundated by mid-priced properties.

"There's going to be a lot of condominiumization," Reeves said. "People owning real estate in the city in the $150,000 to $300,000 range are going to see that market get flooded."

Will the mayor's rent be raised? "That's all up to the landlords, I guess," Reeves joked. "I may be moving to Brockton, too.

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