A plan to merge the central American Jewish fund-raising organizations is facing a critical test, hinging on a proposed guarantee that Israel will not get short shrift when money gets allocated.
Architects of the plan hope to win support for a three-year guaranteed flow of money to Israel and elsewhere overseas, which they have termed the “linchpin” of the plan.
But this guarantee will be a hard sell when the plan is aired in detail for the first time before the leadership of the nation’s local Jewish federations at meetings this weekend in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
The plan’s success or failure may well set the course for how large sums of American Jewish money are raised and distributed as the millennium approaches.
No formal vote is slated for Florida, planners said. They hope that at least five or six major federations will commit themselves to the proposal to build momentum for broader support.
But it is unclear whether that commitment will be secured by the Council of Jewish Federations’ 1996 Leadership Institute this weekend.
“We’re presenting a plan that’s coherent and the deserves support,” said Charles “Corky” Goodman, a co-chairman of the committee that has worked for two years on the restructuring effort.
But it could be “blown out of the water,” which would mean that “it’s back to the drawing board,” said Goodman, sounding dispirited.
As it is, he said, “the time and effort consumed” by the restructuring committee “has deflected from what should be our principal concern – working with our donors and raising the resources to do what needs to be done.”
The overarching plan calls for the consolidation of the Council of Jewish Federations, the United Jewish Appeal and the United Israel Appeal, the agencies that oversee a $725 million national fund-raising campaign annually for local Jewish needs and humanitarian projects in Israel and elsewhere abroad.
The proposed reforms aim to invigorate flat fund-raising campaigns and improve the efficiency and accountability of the central Jewish philanthropic structure.
“If this whole thing doesn’t provide more impetus to develop more resources, it’s a failure,” said Goodman, who is also the chairman of the Board Of Governors of the Jewish Agency for Israel. The Jewish Agency is the principal recipient in Israel of UJA funds and is suffering a budget crisis caused in part by sluggish Diaspora campaigns.
For his part, Joel Tauber, president of the UJA and the other committee co- chairman, was more upbeat about the plan and played down the drama of Florida.
“The make-or-break” period will come “in the 60 days after Florida,” he said.
“The main objective there is to discuss the vision, where the Jewish community is headed,” he said. “Once people understand the mission of the new entity,” the details will be filled in.
Tauber stressed that the meetings would be only “to get the information out. There will be no votes.”
He said feedback would be more systematically sought in the weeks after the meeting in individual and regional consultations with federations.
“We want to get them to participate,” he said.
The committee’s mission is widely supported in principle by federation, which recognize that the current structure is outmoded and needs to change to keep pace with the rapidly changing needs and priorities of the Jewish world.
“There is a tremendous eagerness to get into the issues and a hunger” for reform, said Jacob Solomon, executive vice president of the Greater Miami Jewish Federation.
He said he hoped for serious deliberations in Florida, but that it would be “a mistake” to think that the recommendations would be endorsed at this point.
“These are complicated issues which require time and consensus-building.”
The planners’ thorniest challenge has been to find a way to ensure that the new consolidated entity provides sufficient money for Israel and Jewish projects elsewhere overseas at a time when there is so much competition for funds at home.
Local federations across the country run their fund-raising campaigns in concert with the UJA, but they have zealously protected their autonomy when it comes to deciding how to divide the campaign money between local needs and overseas needs.
The money federations ultimately allocate overseas goes to the UJA for distribution to both the American Jewish Distribution Committee, for humanitarian projects abroad, and to the UIA, which funnels it to the Jewish Agency.
The portion of allocations to Israel has been dropping in recent years, to less than 40 percent in some communities.
Left alone, the federations would be unlikely to reverse this trend. They are now girding for federal budget cuts that could leave gaping holes in some of their local social service agencies.
And they are guarding their resources for efforts to promote and preserve Jewish continuity at home.
It is precisely this downward trend in overseas allocations that has alarmed the UIA and the JDC in particular, and has sparked the call for a temporary guarantee, without which the current plan clearly would not fly.
According to confidential documents of the restructuring committee, “Our collective system by and large is providing less than the required dollars for all purposes, and organizations like JDC and UIA, which technically own the UJA and are organized solely for the purpose of overseas need, cannot be expected to ignore their fundamental responsibilities. They will not vote to end the UJA as we know it without transitional guarantees.”
Such a guarantee, therefore, will “enable them to vote in favor of a transformational new entity,” said the document. The guarantee is designed to produce a minimum of $310 million annually, a sum that is based on the 1994 cash collection of the UJA, excluding special campaigns.
“We will make the best effort to have every community sign on that they will give us the same cash as ’94, but the entity will go forward if 90 percent of the dollars are guaranteed,” Tauber said.
Shoshana Cardin, chair of the UIA, said such safeguards are needed.
“JDC and UIA are being asked to give up ownership of UJA, and that’s a very serious decision,” she said.
For the plan to go forward, she said, “there has to be a comfort level” that overseas needs “will be considered in as important a light as domestic needs.”
She said she was concerned that “the overseas allocation is not considered the bank” to be tapped when federations are strapped for money.
But Cardin said she was not sure that the federations would “buy” the guarantee.
They will, she said, only “if the people coming to Florida go back is `shlichim’ (emissaries) to their communities motivated and knowledgeable about Jewish responsibility and engage seriously in looking at the longer run.”
For Barry Shrage, president of Combined Jewish Philanthropies of Greater Boston, “there is a real need to create a fix for the system” and “the notion for a merger is a positive move.” But, at this historic juncture for the Jewish people, Shrage continued, “it’s hard to give away power to make decisions” even for a three-year period.
“The world may be moving too rapidly to sustain that,” he said.
“Especially in these times, federations are going to look for and need some flexibility,” he said. For example, he said, “we can’t prejudge how communities will meet the need” for serious Jewish learning and engagement that is awakening throughout the country.
For his part, Solomon of Florida sees both positions.
“It is important for open-minded people to understand that what’s being requested is not political in nature and not intended to be opportunistic,” he said of the guarantee.
“On the other side of the coin,” he continued, “I don’t know any community which doesn’t recognize the validity of overseas needs, especially for rescue and resettlement.
“The problem is how federations can cope with enormous pressures of the government cutbacks and the Jewish continuity agenda. It really has to be thought through.”
Also likely to be the subject of intense discussion in Florida is whether the proposed governance plan for the new entity allows for equitable representation by all parties to the merger. The proposal calls for an assembly of up to 600 representatives and a board of between 100 to 125 members.
Federations, said Tauber, would be able to elect 50 percent of the representatives on the two bodies.
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