"The 78 long term protected tenants will be protected in the future," said Susan K. Keller, director of residential real estate at HPRE.
Keller also said Harvard is currently negotiating a sale of 100 units of affordable housing to the city.
HPRE's initiatives have set a standard that other tenants are trying to "We have asked the city council, in following what Harvard did, to implement a transfer tax which goes into an affordable housing trust fund," Geanakakis said. In the city council's next meeting on Monday, members of the Campaign to Save 2,000 Homes said they plan to "expose to the public" the financial status of a number of large property owners, according to Washington Taylor, a local architect and private homeowner in Cambridge involved with the campaign. "The profits of large owners have increased greatly since the end of rent control," said Bill Marcott, a campaign spokesperson in a recent press release. "They should not evict long term residents to make even more." The group will also ask for moderate increases in rent, renewal of all "section 8" contracts and the sale of some buildings at prices reflecting those before rent control, according to a campaign press release. If efforts at settling the crisis are unsuccessful, tenants will take stronger actions, Taylor said. "Since the protected status umbrella ended on the 31st, there are tenants who will refuse to be evicted," he said. "For them and others, we are going to be involved in getting legal services set up." Even if rent increases occur over time, the growth in relocation statistics are inevitable, Taylor said. "The single issue is: Are salaries increasing to the extent that housing costs are rising?," Geanakakis said. "A lot of people aren't going to be able to sustain the increases their getting." "Tenants are organizing and meeting to determine what to do when they get their notices of rent control," she said. "I, for one, have pledged to stay." --Material from wire dispatches were used in compiling this story.