Anti-jewish Blas Charged Against Black Critics of Brooklyn Poverty Program

The chairman of a project for poor Jews in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn funded by the Crown Heights anti-poverty agency said today that he felt that opposition to the work of the agency by a black legislator, State Senator Waldaba Stewart, Brooklyn Democrat, Stemmed from the fact that some of the agency’s projects benefit poor Jews in the area. The assertion was made by Abraham Gelb, executive director of Operation Belfrye, an acronym for Better Living for Residents of Yiddish-Speaking Environments. Operation Belfrye is one of several projects for poor Jews in the area funded through the Crown Heights Community Corp. Crown Heights is one of two of the city’s 26 officially-designated poverty areas where Jews have substantial representation on the local community corporations through which poverty funds are channeled by the Council Against Poverty, the policy-making city agency for poverty programs, and the Community Development Agency, the operating arm of the Council. Crown Heights has been the scene of sharp differences between Jews and blacks over such funding. Sen. Stewart, has joined with Assemblyman-elect Vander L. Beatty, in urging that the anti-poverty agency be closed until an election can be held to involve “more of the community.” Stewart also asked that the corporation be placed in receivership by the Council Against Poverty.

They also demanded the dismissal of Simon Levine, a black, the agency’s director, “to prevent further polarization of the races.” They said they were making the proposals “because of the growing concern of the people in the Crown Heights area.” Gelb told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that there was concern among Crown Heights residents but that the concern was over the prospect that such activities as those of the black legislators might disrupt the work of the anti-poverty agency. Levine, responding to the ouster demand, said that “we know that the political intervention of Stewart and Beatty would only benefit the chosen few handpicked by the two men.” Other sources confirmed to the JTA the view that “outsider” opposition to the work of the anti poverty agency was due to the determination of some Crown Heights black activist groups that none of the anti-poverty funds go for aid to Jews. Sen. Stewart charged that “Levine and other officials in the corporation have distributed funds on the basis of race rather than on the percentage of poverty in the community.” That charge was rejected by Allan Fischer, chairman of the Crown Heights Community Corp., who told the JTA that all decisions on funding are made by majority vote of the bi-racial board and must be approved by the Council Against Poverty.

CITY OFFICIAL OPPOSES PLACING ANTI-POVERTY AGENCY IN RECEIVERSHIP

Gelb said that every project funded last year was cut because of federal cutbacks except Operation Discovery, a project for blacks. He said that the anti-poverty agency board had voted to eliminate Operation Discovery after a determination that it was not being operated effectively and that the decision had been overruled by the Council Against Poverty and had received its initial full funding. Fischer, who said the present board composition is half Jewish and half black, and who was elected chairman last August by votes of all but one of the 17 board members, said Levine was doing a satisfactory job and that he had the confidence of the board. The crown Heights program was started in October. 1969 with an annual budget of $700,000. Levine said last June that the agency’s 30-man staff was black by a margin of 2-1, and that the three black-controlled delegate agencies had received about $192,000 in financing to $145,000 for the one Jewish-operated agency. He said then that this was in line with the 1960 census data, which showed a total population in Crown Heights of 211,000, with 52.3 percent non-white and 47.7 percent white.

A spokesman for the Mayor’s office told the JTA that there was no basis for putting the anti-poverty agency into receivership, a position supported by Fischer. A regular election of board members, who are chosen on a rotating basis annually over a three-year period, was postponed last year because of tensions in the area. A panel meeting was scheduled for last night for the Crown heights agency at the Manhattan office of the Council Against Poverty to consider setting a date for the postponed election. However, Fischer said, a quorum failed to materialize and the meeting was rescheduled for next Monday night. Last July 20, the offices of the Crown Heights Jewish Community Council, an umbrella agency for Jewish organizations and synagogues in the area, was wrecked by a firebomb. Some 30 Crown Heights rabbis and communal workers staged a protest meeting at City Hall last Sept. 10, protesting that there was “discrimination” by city agencies against Jews in general and residents of Crown Heights “in particular” and that there was a “conspiracy” by a “militant few” to drive all Jews out of Crown Heights. There have been no arrests in the firebombing.