Jcca Has Difficulty in Placing 5 Black Jewish Children in Foster Homes

The Jewish Child Care Association has been trying for more than a year to place five Black Jewish children in Jewish foster homes, so far without success, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency learned today. A JCCA source told the JTA that its last mailing of 1700 letters in mid-Jan. to rabbis, congregations and Jewish organizations in the New York metropolitan area seeking homes for the youngsters, drew not a single response. Neither did advertisements the child care agency placed in Jewish newspapers and periodicals, the source said.

But Bob Coleman, director of the department for social justice of the Synagogue Council of America told the JTA today that the SCA working jointly with the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies has met with some success. He said 2-3 white Jewish families had expressed interest in accepting the children and were currently under investigation as prospective foster homes.

The case involves five children of Mrs. Grace Kutchera–boys aged 6-10–who is a Black Jewish convert, a divorcee and lives in the Bronx. Because of personal problems, she placed the boys with the JCCA for temporary foster care in Feb. 1973. According to Mrs. Kutchera. the two oldest and two youngest boys were placed immediately–but in Protestant homes. The two oldest were attending church but the JCCA said that had been stopped and the youngsters now attend a Hebrew school.

FURTHER PLACEMENT EFFORTS BEING MADE

Last Jan. 15, Mrs. Kutchera brought the matter to the Council for Jewish Poor, service arm of the Association of Jewish Anti-Poverty Workers. S. Elly Rosen, executive director of the Association, told the JTA that he contacted the JCCA on Jan. 24 to find out what was being done. He said he was told by Charles Solomon, director of the JCCA’s foster homes division that two of the youngsters were placed temporarily at the JCCA’s cottages in Pleasantville, N.Y, Rosen complained that the cottages did not provide kosher food.

A JCCA source told the JTA that the hostel was kosher. Solomon, who was contacted by the JTA, refused to discuss the Kutchera case or to acknowledge that it was in the JCCA’s hands. Another JCCA source said, however, that its placement efforts on behalf of the Kutchera children were continuing and that another mailing was in process. The source said the agency experienced its greatest difficulties in placing two categories of children in Jewish foster homes–Black children and handicapped children.

According to Coleman, the JCCA was not reaching the Jewish religious community. He said he anticipated that the children would be placed in Jew ish homes as a result of the efforts of a joint commission established Jan. 24 by the SCA and the Federation’s religious affairs department headed by Rabbi Isaac Training. The JTA was unable to contact Mrs. Kutchera today for further comment.