Harvey D. Kushner, former head of a private consulting firm and a former Kensington resident, died July 31 at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles after suffering a fall. He was 86.
The son of Morris Kushner and Hilda Kushner, owners of a dry-cleaning establishment, Harvey David Kushner was born in Brooklyn, N.Y., and moved in 1933 with his family to Annellen Road in Northwest Baltimore.
He was a 1948 graduate of Polytechnic Institute and earned a bachelor’s degree in 1952 from the Johns Hopkins University’s Whiting School of Engineering.
After college, he worked during the Korean War as a civilian at the Navy Bureau of Ships in Washington. He later joined Operations Research Inc. in Silver Spring, where he rose to become its president and CEO.
In 1965, after a series of acquisitions, the company was renamed ORI Group Inc., and eventually was merged into ARC Inc., a public technology company.
Mr. Kushner left the company in 1977 and established Kushner Management Planning Corp., a private government consulting company. He closed the firm and retired in 2007.
While living in Montgomery County, he chaired the Commission on Higher Education and Technology that led to two graduate education campuses for the Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland.
He was a co-founder of the Montgomery County High Technology Council, and for six years served as its first chairman. Today, it is known as the Maryland Tech Council, a statewide organization.
In 1950, he married Rose Rehert, who became a prominent expert on breast cancer and was a member of the National Cancer Advisory Board. She died in 1990 from the disease.
Mr. Kushner served as a director of the Rose Kushner Breast Cancer Advisory Center, where he published “If You’ve Thought About Breast Cancer,” which was written by his wife in 1980.
He was a member of the New York Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
He was a former member of the National Advisory Council of the Whiting School of Engineering at Johns Hopkins and the board of visitors of the Biotechnology Institute and former chairman of the board of visitors of the School for Public Affairs, both at the University of Maryland.
After his wife’s death, Mr. Kushner moved to Palos Verdes Estates, Calif.
He was also an artist and violinist, and returned often to Annapolis, where he owned a series of boats and enjoyed sailing the Chesapeake Bay.
Plans for a memorial service to be held in Baltimore in September are incomplete.
He is survived by two sons, Gantt Kushner of Silver Spring and Todd Kushner of Salt Lake City; a daughter, Lesley Kushner of Los Angeles; and his companion, Dr. Patricia Sacks of Palos Verdes Estates.
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