Project Renewal: A Caution
Jaffe, Eleizer
PROJECT ELIEZAR RENEWAL: JAFFE A CAUTION Mr. Begin has chosen slum renovation as his major effort to alleviate the distress of low-income, mostly forgotten immigrants who arrived in...
...And the best brains in planning and urban renewal, in and out of Israel, should be involved in the project...
...Even if the next Parliamentary elections are three years away, the public will appreciate a good start on the housing issues...
...The local corporations could be Ottomanic Associations, with broad local representation which would develop a master plan for their neighborhoods, a timetable and proposed budget, and present their proposal to the housing project directorate for funding...
...Challenges for Israel For the Israelis, the goal of renovating 160 slum neighborhoods in Eliezer D. Jaffe teaches at the School of Social Work of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem...
...After less than a year in the office, the Prime Minister confronted diaspora fund raisers with a plan to rehabilitate 160 slum neighborhoods, within five years, at a cost of 1.2 billion dollars...
...it's bad conditioning for the receivers and sloppy philanthropy by the donors...
...If we could explain the kind of social services we need, diaspora Jews could understand what we are talking about and they could mobilize to help us do the job properly...
...In fact, the American Jewish welfare experience is much richer and more progressive than the Israeli experience, which tends more towards physical and logistical manipulation rather than individualization of clients and client participation...
...It's no wonder more and more givers are being turned off by appeals to stereotyped, hit-and-run requests for generic charity for Israel...
...Why should the housing project be any different...
...To avoid a fiasco, perhaps it would be wise to promise less, to spend at least a year dealing with four or five neighborhoods, developing models for comprehensive, integrated physical and social renewal and inter-agency cooperation...
...Even if the government could raise Israel's half of the money (presumably from Israel Bonds) in that period of time, we have no time-tested models of how to renovate slum neighborhoods, of coordinating the local, district, and national agencies involved, and of integrating social services with housing...
...Tens of thousands of Israeli families have been waiting nearly thirty years for this project...
...One of the best examples of the focused, personal touch is provided by the Everett family of New York, who adopted the township of Hatzor and have driven every top Israeli official up the wall lobbying for services in Hatzor—to say nothing of their own financial commitment...
...in Israel, namely, contractual funding based on local initiative and application review by a professional panel...
...five years is impractical...
...Because the stakes are so high for both of the partners, in terms of money as well as credibility, it might be helpful to call attention to some "nuts and bolts" issues that cannot be overlooked...
...Milwaukee or Rochester could take on Neveh Eliezer in Tel Aviv for ten years...
...PROJECT ELIEZAR RENEWAL: JAFFE A CAUTION Mr...
...Grandiose promises which cannot be delivered will boomerang, no matter what the excuses or who gets the blame...
...Dulzin, the new Chairman of the Jewish Agency, has rightly convinced the Agency heads of the need to attack slum housing, but he is far out in front of his diaspora troops and it is they who will have to raise the funds...
...Giving for the "housing project" would be more personalized and a better understanding of Israel could result from the contact...
...Finally, diaspora leadership must insist on real, not benevolent, partnership with the Israelis on the housing project...
...This model has been very successful for stimulating services to the aged in Israel, and may be worth copying in the housing field as well...
...Is it so farfetched to insist on a two-hour site visit or slide presentation to top UJA executives in America or in Israel on each neighborhood proposed for renewal...
...In moving away from charity, the diaspora fund raisers could ask local Israeli communities to establish non-profit housing corporations in order to apply for funds from the housing project directorate...
...Because of the importance of the Begin housing project, it should receive high priority in the Housing and Construction Ministry, the Labor and Social Affairs Ministry, the Education Ministry, the Interior Ministry and the Finance Ministry...
...Perhaps diaspora communities could be recruited to take on, as their own personal project, the rehabilitation of one or more slum neighborhoods in Israel...
...Diaspora money should not be handed out as gifts from above...
...The housing project could be a way for personalizing the whole effort and replacing charity with partnership...
...It is absolutely crucial, feasible, exciting, and long overdue...
...We have a tradition of discouraging residents' involvement with the physical improvement of their homes, and little experience with comprehensive urban planning...
...To do this, UJA leadership will have to get into the neighborhoods for a first-hand understanding of what they have bitten off and for briefings on the nuts-and-bolts of what is going on with their money...
...And diaspora Jews know well what is meant by quality, professional services...
...Moreover, some of the renewal that has taken place in cities like Jerusalem has been poorly supervised and is already in need of repair...
...Therefore, it is worth doing well...
...How many of the planners have acquainted themselves with the "souls" of the 160 neighborhoods slated for rehabilitation...
...What mechanisms will guarantee that these features will be controlled...
...Since more than half of the money has been requested from the UJA and Keren Hayesod, above and beyond their regular campaigns, the ability or failure to recruit these sums, and the ability or failure of the Israelis to deliver the rehabilitated housing, can have far-reaching political and personal repercussions for both the UJA and the Israeli leadership...
...This has been a Jewish field of endeavor for centuries, and every welfare federation knows the value of its local agencies...
...There should be a watchdog committee of Israeli and diaspora Jews to review project proposals and make professional recommendations to the fund raisers and provide consultation to the recipients and applicants for grants...
...One of the most distressing features of government in Israel is the lack of coordination and the inter-departmental preoccupation with territorial sovereignty over services...
...Will the physical renovation really be simultaneous with the social work and other professional manpower inputs, and who will decide on the level of need...
...This would result in local initiative for planning and implementation of neighborhood rehabilitation, and would end the present tradition of bestowing benevolent gifts on relatively passive and fragmented local agencies...
...Most important of all, the fund raisers must do their homework and insist on detailed accountability from the Israelis for the planning and implementation of the project...
...Who will be the project directors and what authority will they have to get anything done...
...Social services are an important, new cornerstone of the proposed housing project...
...Challenge For World Jewry I recently visited a number of prominent heads of American Jewish welfare federations...
...Begin was not shooting from the hip when he put his weight on housing and social services...
...Professor Yadin, as Deputy Prime Minister, might personally make the housing project his legacy to the social fabric of Israel...
...Every visiting group from the "adopting" American city would see the neighborhood they're working on, hear what's happening and what's not happening and be pleased or angered by the results of their effort...
...Begin has chosen slum renovation as his major effort to alleviate the distress of low-income, mostly forgotten immigrants who arrived in Israel from the Middle Eastern countries during the first decade of the State...
...Housing" and "slums" have never been presented to American Jews as fund raising goals, and unfortunately, donations reach their peak when Israel goes to war...
...But perhaps the UJA and Keren Hayesod can use this situation to get people more involved as partners in Israel's affairs...
...There should be careful financial bookkeeping for the project, both in Israel and the diaspora...
...In effect, the housing project would adopt the funding strategy now practiced by the J.D.C...
...The "pocket-parks" which are bragged about are poor imitations of real parks, with their monotonous sandboxes and infant slides, not to mention their frequent state of disrepair...
...It will take nearly a year to gear up the proper publicity and information needed to understand the importance of the project and develop the mechanics for its implementation...
...He was an Associate Professor of Social Work in the United States, immigrated to Israel in 1960, was director of the Department of Family and Community Services of the Jerusalem Municipality, and a member of the Prime Minister's Committee on Disadvantaged Youth...
...They have a tough road ahead...
...For one thing, the fund raisers could insist on toning down the housing project to reasonable dimensions...
...What do the municipalities and their political leaders have in mind for the 160 neighborhoods...
...Who has reliable, recent data on the physical and social makeup of these neighborhoods...
...There should be established channels for immediate feedback to UJA and the Jewish communities involved...
...Who has talked with the neighborhood committee or with the social service deliverers in those neighborhoods...
...Would any business executive run his personal business without site visits, demographic data, personnel assessments, and timetables...
...There is great anxiety that the Inter-Ministerial Committee (composed of senior representatives from the various ministries) and the Ministers Committee on Slum Housing will, for lack of strong central leadership, result in uncoordinated activity...
...Why shouldn't Cleveland Jewry adopt, for the next decade, the Katamon eight and nine (Chet and Tet) neighborhoods...
...There seems to be a consensus among them that they will have difficulty raising their regular UJA campaign quotas, and they are genuinely concerned about an additional campaign for the special housing project...
...Neighborhoods, like people, have souls...
...That's the kind of intelligent, non-charity approach we need from diaspora Jews...
Vol. 3 • September 1978 • No. 9
