Levine is one of hundreds of landlords who aremoving to abolish rent control.

In hopes of overturning rent control policiesin Cambridge and Boston, opponents of rent controlrecently gathered thousands of signatures onpetitions to put a referendum on the state ballotin November. The question of whether thereferendum will make it to the ballot is now beingdecided in court.

But tenants say that without controls, rents inthe city would be too high.

"Rents here are totally obscene," says Kaufmanof the Cambridge Tenants Union. "They areastronomical, extortionist. Who the hell pays thiskind of money for rent?"

Rend control was enacted three decades ago inpart to prevent expansion by Harvard and MIT intoCambridge's old neighborhoods. It reduced theincentive for Harvard to become a landlord bymaking it more difficult to make money by rentingspace.

"The amount of territory taken up by theuniversities was such that it brought up thepossibilities of Harvard and MIT meeting somewherenear Central Square," says Michael H. Turk, whoheaded the now defunct Harvard Tenants Union.

"If they expand and eliminate apartments orjack up rents, where are those tenants going togo?" he asks.

Turk also says the Removal Ordinance of 1979,which prohibited conversion of rental apartmentsto other purposes, helped prevent universityexpansion.

But Turk says rent control has not badly hurtHarvard, which is both the largest tenant andlargest owner of rent-controlled property in thecity.

"Harvard has been able to use the system to itsown advantage, often to the detriment of tenants,"says Turk, who is now co-chair of the CambridgeTenants Union.

Turk says Harvard constantly makes capitalimprovements to buildings--a process which enablesthe University to petition the rentcontrol boardfor rent increases.

Because of this process, Turk says there is a"generous rate of return" on capital improvements.

But Harvard Real Estate President Kristin S.Demong says rent control actually prevents theUniversity from recovering the money spent forcapital improvements.

"We don't recoup our costs," she says. "[Rentcontrol] is not providing any sort of returns thatare reasonable."

She says Harvard Real Estate owns approximately700 rent controlled units, rents for which rangefrom about 50 percent to about 90 percent ofmarket value.

Demong says Harvard has not taken a position onrent control, but she believes it should bereformed. "It's extremely administrativelycumbersome," she says.

Reforms should include "making it easier tomake legitimate improvements [to property],"according to Demong. She says rent control shouldalso be means-tested to avoid subsidizinghigh-income tenants