Harvard Students Want Homeless Shelter

Students angry at Harvard University for covering heating vents that street people used to warm themselves demanded Thursday that the school open a campus shelter for the homeless.

“I’ve never seen students so upset about an issue,” said senior Julie Schrager. “People who never thought about the homeless are amazed at the callousness and uncaring shown by Harvard University.”

Schrager said hundreds of students want the school to uncover the heating vents behind a dormitory and open a daytime shelter for the homeless in the dorm’s basement.

Iron Grilles

The vents, behind a 450-student brick dormitory named Leverett House, were covered with tent-shaped iron grilles Monday to force away the street people who regularly congregated near the building and were fed by students.

The installation coincided with frigid winds and the coldest temperatures of the winter.

Leverett House Master John E. Dowling, a biology professor, said he decided to cover the heating vents after several students in the coeducational dorm complained about physical and verbal harassment from the street people.

“These incidents date back at least three years and the more serious ones have involved a rather severe fight between two individuals occupying the vents, the pulling of a knife on a student and voyeurism,” Dowling wrote in a letter delivered to students Thursday.

‘Badly Frightened’

“Less than two weeks ago, one of our students was badly frightened by one of the street people shouting loudly and irrationally as she passed by and a few days later, one was observed conspicuously urinating just a few feet from the building.”

In an afternoon news conference in front of the vents, Harvard Dean L. Fred Jewett said the university is sensitive to the needs of the homeless, but removing the grilles would only be a short-term solution.

“I think Harvard, as a responsible member of the Boston-Cambridge community, should be involved,” he said. “I think we all have the responsibility to work until these problems are eradicated. But I doubt that any students . . . would say this is a good permanent solution.”

Shelter in Basement

Dowling’s assistant, Diane Bowen, said officials had not ruled out the possibility of opening a small homeless shelter in the Leverett basement.

Schrager, a 20-year-old history major, said she and 250 other Harvard students volunteer at homeless shelters in the Boston area.

“Perhaps I’m less squeamish about the homeless because I am used to working with them,” she said. “But Harvard can’t shunt away this problem from its ivory tower. The grates won’t make the problem go away.”