Two Dispute Charge That Maimonides Hospital is ‘block-busting’

Daniel L. Dube, president of the Community League for Maimonides Hospital in the Boro Park section of Brooklyn, said today that the hospital was making an effort to fill staff vacancies with local neighborhood people but conceded that in the past it may have hired a disproportionate number of outsiders.

In a telephone interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Dube denied emphatically that the hospital was engaging in “block-busting” tactics to acquire nearby property to house Black and Puerto Rican employes. The block-busting charge was made by a croup calling itself Citizens for a Better Boro Park which staged a demonstration outside of the hospital yesterday. They demanded that the hospital give priority to hiring residents of the neighborhood which is predominantly Jewish.

Dube, a businessman who manufactures surgical instruments, said the hospital claimed It was unable to find prospective employes in the neighborhood but that he personally did not agree. He said that since the Community League brought the matter to the attention of the hospital authorities, one local Jew was added to the kitchen staff, another was engaged as a dietician and a third as a carpenter.

He said the hospital has placed want ads in the Jewish Press, a local Jewish weekly, and in II Progresso, an Italian language newspaper. Dube said the population of Boro Park was a mixture of Jewish and Italian with Blacks and Puerto Ricans living in some sections. He described the Community League as a liaison group between the community and Maimonides, one of the largest Jewish voluntary hospital in the city.

NO DISCRIMINATION IN HIRING

Dube said he did not know the people involved in the Citizens, for a Better Boro Park. He said he was “Inclined to believe” that their demonstration was linked to recent efforts by ultra-Orthodox elements in Boro Park to convert Maimonides into a “glatt kosher” hospital and install their kashrut supervisors.

He said that the majority of the patients were not Orthodox but that the hospital is kosher and employs a mashgiach, kashrut supervisor. Dube said the hospital recently acquired nearby property earmarked for future expansion. He said that for the time being it was used to house families of employes, most of whom are Black or Puerto Rican. He said the employes included registered nurses, attendants and ambulance drivers, some of whom have lived in the neighborhood for years.

Peter Baglio, deputy executive vice-president of Maimonides Hospital told the JTA that it did not discriminate in hiring and employed qualified persons of all ethnic groups. He said he thought the hospital staff reflected the composition of the surrounding community. Baglio said the hospital was working through local YMHA’s and synagogues to recruit personnel from the neighborhood.

He too dismissed charges of block-busting and said part of the adjacent property was acquired by the Metropolitan Jewish Geriatric Center which is presently building a nursing and old aged home on the site. He said the Center selected the site because of its proximity to Maimonides which will provide medical services for Its residents when completed.