Channel 13 to Clarify Charges Against Anti-poverty Programs

The producer of the 51st State, a news commentary program of WNET-TV (Channel 13), a public service station, said today that the program tonight will contain some “minor clarifications” in charges made against two Orthodox rabbis of misuse of federal anti-poverty funds in programs for the Jewish poor.

However, Hal Levenson, the producer, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the program was standing by the basic charges made in a series of programs during January involving Rabbi Ronald Greenwald, Rabbi Bernard Weinberger, and the Council of Jewish Manpower Association. The Council was selected by the Federal Labor Department to administer a manpower training program in poor Jewish neighborhoods.

Rabbi Weinberger, an administrator in the City’s Human Resources Administration, flatly denied all charges. Rabbi Greenwald, a consultant to region II of the federal Health, Education and Welfare Administration, could not be reached for comment.

It was asserted on one of the programs that at least $10,000 in manpower funds had gone to a gasoline station and to a limousine service, both in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, as payment for “training fees.” The program said Rabbi Greenwald was an officer in both businesses. A second grant under study was one for $65,000 to Jewish Orthodox Youth. Rabbi Weinberger is president of JOY and of the Council of Jewish Manpower Association. The grant to JOY, which was arranged through Marvin Schick, a former Lindsay Administration consultant, was designed to help Hasidic youth gain admission to secular colleges. It is called Talent Search.

RABBI RECEIVED ONLY $1 A DAY

Levenson told the JTA that the program had said Rabbi Weinberger received $138 a day as a consultant to the White House. He said the program will report that Rabbi Weinberger received $1 a day and that he had since been dropped as a result of investigations by the New York City investigation department.

Levenson said that some viewers may have received the impression that Schick was one of the three Jewish leaders mentioned as involved in the alleged fraud. He said the program expressed regrets that it had led any viewer to assume that Schick was involved either in the fraud or with the Nixon Administration. Levenson said that the program would report that Rabbi Greenwald had been dropped as a consultant to HEW. It was initially reported that probes into the charges had been started by the U.S. federal attorney Paul Curran and by City Investigations Commissioner Nicolas Scopetta.