“We want to keep it as a neighborhood. We want to make sure we’re well situated and community-based,” she says. “That’s what we have here.”

Lawrence Fiorentino, Josephine’s son and a member of Charlesview’s board, says that residents have little to fear.

“We are very upfront, very forthright, we have more protections for them than they know,” Fiorentino says.

While Fiorentino emphasized that Charlesview has not had any official meetings with Harvard, he says an agreement is possible.

“Being a non-profit organization, if somebody were to approach us and say, ‘Let’s sit down at the table,’ we would be foolish if we did not sit at the table,” he says.

The building complex, constructed in the 1960s and composed of both low-income and market-rate apartments, is in need of “absolute repair,” according to Fiorentino.

In order to pay for building improvements, the board is currently negotiating a significant raise in rents with the Dept. of Housing and Urban Development, which helps to fund and oversee Charlesview.

“The building has almost reached its useful life,” Fiorentino says. “If we don’t do something, no matter what it is, the tenants will be in worse shape.”

Giobandetto, who has lived in the apartment building for two years, says she is confident that negotiations could result in benefits for Charlesview and its tenants.

“Change is usually pretty good and everybody needs to accept that,” she says. “The talk in the parking lot is, ‘Is Harvard going to buy us? Then get them to fix the dumpster problem.’ I think there’s a sense Harvard could make things better.”

But in the meantime, residents are fearful about what their future could hold.

“The unknown is what’s scary,” she says. “Once you know what’s going on you can adjust to that.”

Two for the Road

Sandwiched between the Business School and the rest of Harvard’s Allston property, three other Western Avenue properties form an essential connection to Harvard’s future campus.

Just down the road from Charlesview, the public television station WGBH and its tenant, a Pepsi storage facility, have already gone to the bargaining table with the University.