Kosher Butchers Capitulate, Slice 4 Cents off Price of Meat

A city-wide reduction of four cents per pound in the price of kosher meat and five cents per pound in poultry was forecast yesterday when Brighton Beach butchers and Brooklyn poultry dealers reached agreements to that effect with the City Action Committee against the High Cost of Living.

The reductions, the first fruit of the consumers’ boycott against high wholesale prices begun two weeks ago, are subject to the approval of housewives’ mass-meetings in the respective sections of the city.

Representatives of other sectional butchers’ organizations conferred with the action committee all day yesterday and were expected to make similar concessions by today. Negotiations in various sections were begun after conferences with the Federation of Kosher Butchers proved fruitless.

Rose Nelson of the committee, reporting the victory, emphasized that the reductions will be borne by the wholesalers who will reduce prices to the retailers. A reduction in the price of expensive meats alone had been turned down in previous negotiations with the Federation. The original aim of the boycott was a ten-cents per pound cut.

With negotiations in progress, kosher butchers who responded to the call of the Federation to end the one-week sympathy strike were picketed by housewives, and it was reported that little business went on. It was estimated that almost half of the butchers kept their stores closed either in sympathy with the consumers’ boycott or through lack of business.

A conference of women prominent in civic and philanthropic activities in the Bronx, to prepare for the June Night Frolic to be held under the auspices of the Jewish National Fund, will be held this afternoon at the Concourse Plaza Hotel. The conference has been called by a special committee consisting of Mrs. M. Maldwin Fertig, Mrs. Benjamin Antin, Mrs. Henry A. Schorr and Mrs. Bella Schuman.