‘further Study’ Promised Four Jewish Groups Protest Fuentes Appointment at Meeting with Nyc School C

A spokesman for four Jewish organizations said today, after a meeting with New York City School Chancellor Harvey Scribner over the appointment of Luis Fuentes which they had previously denounced, that the chancellor had said he would have the appointment “studied further.” Representatives of the American Jewish Congress, the American Jewish Committee, the Jewish Labor Committee and the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith met for two hours this morning with Scribner and Joseph Monserrat, president of the city Board of Education.

Fuentes, who assumed the position of Superintendent of School District One on the Lower East Side of Manhattan Tuesday, after election by the local community school board, has been accused of making anti-Semitic and anti-Italian remarks while he was principal of PS 155 in the Ocean Hill-Brownsville section of Brooklyn. The spokesman said the four groups “made our position known.” Though no specific date was set for further discussions, the spokesman said the meeting today was not considered a “final” one by the four groups.

A meeting is planned for tomorrow morning between the four groups and New York City Human Rights Commissioner Eleanor Holmes Norton to further discuss the Fuentes case. Mrs. Norton said that although her commission does not have direct jurisdiction over the case, she is “very disturbed” by Fuentes’ alleged anti-Semitic statements. “Our job is to forestall intergroup conflict,” she explained, “but I can’t say what’s appropriate in this case yet.” The chancellor later issued a statement saying he “understood” the concerns of the four organizations and that “I share their long-standing objective of mutual respect for all ethnic groups.”