Synagogues Organize for Service in Unemployment Crisis

The New York Board of Jewish Ministers, which includes over one hundred rabbis serving congregations in greater New York and which represents the orthodox, conservative and liberal sections of the Jewish community, has appointed a special committee on unemployment to organize the synagogues of the city for service in the aid of unemployment. The Chairman of this Committee on Unemployment is Rabbi Sidney E. Goldstein, Associate Rabbi of the Free Synagogue and Professor of Social Service of the Jewish Institute of Religion, and the other members are Rabbi Max Drob, Rabbi Joshua Goldberg, Rabbi Leo Jung, Rabbi Samuel Levinson, Rabbi Alter Landesman, Rabbi Clifton H. Levy, Rabbi D. de Sola Pool and Rabbi William F. Rosenbloom. This Committee has prepared a program of work which has been approved by the New York Board of Jewish Ministers and which is designed to enlist every synagogue in the city in immediate and active service.

A committee on unemployment is being formed in each synagogue and will undertake to organize the congregation. The program of the rabbis include measures for immediate relief, methods of providing temporary employment and finally a long range plan that aims to prevent a recurrence of the catastrophe of unemployment. The synagogues are urged to create an unemployment fund and each member, clergy and laity alike, is called upon to contribute one day’s salary a month. This fund will be expended in forms of service indicated by the Coordination Committee of the Community Program.