Having coordinated the organized Jewish community’s advocacy on behalf of Soviet Jews for the last three years, Martin Wenick is about to turn his attention to overseeing the resettlement of those who come to the United States.
Wenick, who has served as executive director of the National Conference of Soviet Jewry since 1989, has been named executive vice president of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, as of July 1.
Wenick’s move parallels the emigration trends from the former Soviet Union. Last month, for the first time since 1989, more Jews from the former Soviet Union entered the United States as refugees than made aliyah to Israel.
One expected consequence of Wenick’s departure from the National Conference will be discussion of the continued role for the 21-year-old advocacy group, now that the original goals of free emigration and the freedom of Jewish expression in Russia and the other former Soviet republics have been achieved.
“Obviously, it’s an organization that should be able, at some point in time, to go out of business,” said Wenick.
“But that time has not arrived yet. The situation (in the former Soviet Union) remains highly unstable; the economic situation is not getting better, only worse.”
Shoshana Cardin, chairman of the National Conference, said that “the instability that exists now in the republics, the ethnic tensions in Georgia and Moldova, signal that there is greater work to do.”
As its mission has been redefined in recent years, the National Conference has seen its major responsibilities as monitoring emigration and the situation of Jews in the former Soviet Union, lobbying the newly independent republics to codify emigration rights and prevent anti-Semitism, and maintaining a link between the Jewish communities of the two former Cold War enemies.
RESTRUCTURING ANTICIPATED
But Cardin acknowledged that “we have to restructure our resources,” pointing out that the tightly budgeted agency maintains two offices and staffs, in New York and Washington.
The possibility exists that the restructuring will be far-reaching.
“There has to be a thorough going-over of procedures,” said Phil Baum, who, as associate executive director of the American Jewish Congress, sits on the National Conference board.
“Everything is open to discussion,” he said. “I don’t think there’s been that kind of discussion since the Soviet Union went out of business.”
Wenick, a former State Department official whose 27-year tenure included two postings in the Soviet Union, brings to HIAS fluency in Russian and contacts in Washington and Moscow. These same assets were valued at the National Conference, where he will continue as a consultant for a six-month transition period.
“In the first several weeks, we’ll find out if it’s 20 percent or 10 percent of his time,” said Cardin, adding: “He cannot serve as executive director of both organizations,” as had been rumored.
The new job will involve much of the same extended set of Jewish communal lay leaders. But Wenick said that “it’s a different type of focus.”
“HIAS is responsible for ensuring entry into the United States, seeing that resettlement goes as smoothly as possible and making the maximum amount of funds available for this process,” he said.
While the National Conference is budgeted at under $1 million, HIAS has a budget of $12 million. About $2.6 million of that comes from Jewish federations; a significant part of the remainder represents government grants for processing refugees.
BATTLE OVER REFUGEE FUNDING
The first test of Wenick’s government expertise is likely to be a legislative battle shaping up over refugee funding. One Bush administration proposal would cut the government’s participation in refugee resettlement from $410 million to $227 million, with a proportionate effect on the 40,000 Jewish refugees expected from the former Soviet Union during the 1993 fiscal year.
The actual resettling of the refugees is handled in individual communities, generally by the local Jewish family service, with the aid of these federal funds. But HIAS works under contract of the State Department to monitor the local agencies.
Before the emigres arrive at their American destination, HIAS is responsible for both securing transportation and helping them with the refugee process.
One of the agency’s major concerns is tracking the numbers of the emigrants and their destinations in America. While HIAS has long wanted an office in Moscow to help monitor the flow, such proposals were scuttled, in large part because of Israeli perceptions that HIAS would try to lure away potential immigrants from Israel.
In reality, say HIAS officials, those Russians and others coming to the United States do so for the purposes of family reunification.
“If you’re a cousin or uncle or aunt, you have almost no chance of coming as refugee.” said Ben Zion Leuchter, whose tenure as HIAS president ends on June 4.
“If you’re willing to wait for 10 years, fine If you think the Commonwealth of Independent States is a dangerous place for Jews to live, then go to Israel.”
Leuchter said that lacking a Moscow office, “it’s very important to have somebody like Marty Wenick, who has a tremendous number of contacts in the Soviet Union.”
HIAS is also getting a new president, former New Jersey state Assemblyman Martin Kesselhaut.
Wenick is filling a position that has been vacant since the departure of Karl Zukerman last October.
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