Soviet Resettlement: An Update
Weiner, Jon
SOVIET RESETTLEMENT: JON AN UPDATE * WEINER Nothing is ever as simple as it should be. The current exodus of Jews from the Soviet Union should be good news, news for rejoicing, a matter for...
...But ask around among officials of the Federations, the Jewish Agency, and the United Jewish Appeal, and you will hear three different stories about Soviet Jews, none of them simple...
...If the day schools are their cup of borscht,.t.hen the kids will keep going...
...It is hard to know yet what the financial repercussions are in Chicago, because it's all happening so fast...
...They are resourceful, motivated, and dynamic people...
...The wave of new emigres has given the Diaspora a major jolt, and a major opportunity...
...And once in Vienna, the refugees make some choices...
...But they don't...
...The great policy issues aside, we can at least take pride in a human job well done...
...A school has been set up in the town of Ostia, just outside Rome, where the children can study English and Hebrew, and adults can take orientation classes...
...In America at the turn of the century the German Jews, who got here first, resented the Eastern European Jews...
...Both were engineers...
...Also, the ratio between the Jewish community and the refugee community is more favorable—most get jobs through the Jewish Vocational Service...
...The children all get one-year scholarships to the Jewish day schools, and 50 percent scholarships in the second year (when they cut the aid completely after one year, it proved too abrupt a change...
...With inflation, and shrinkage, they may get as little as 40 percent of the total raised by the local federations...
...Early this year, some of the American communities taking the largest numbers of refugees were swamped and asked HIAS not to send any more till they caught up...
...And about a year ago, a close friend of the first couple came, with their one child...
...But this is a serious problem, and eventually, if it's not tackled, it will tear down the Jewish community...
...in some cases, of stellar talent...
...But the buck stops with the JFCS and the Federations, and the quicker processing means less time to plan the replacement, to negotiate with stateside relations, to arrange housing— increasing costs...
...If you're 24, and just got out of the army, and are getting married, and you're told you have to wait three years for an apartment, you're likely to get pretty annoyed when an immigrant who has just arrived is placed ahead of you on the apartment list...
...The JFCS is adding staff, and under pressure even this is difficult: they need to find the right kind of people, and even the right kind of people must be trained in the system, and on-the-job training slows things down...
...Many were impressed...
...Ben Gurion used to say that if there were 5 million Jews in Israel, no one in his right mind would ever question the right of the state to exist...
...And Leon Dulzin, chairman of the Jewish Agency, believes these Jews are Israel's last chance for a significant population increase...
...The earlier immigrants to Israel, those who arrived in the 40's and 50's, went through hard times...
...The smallest communities, like Waco, Texas, or Lawrence, Mass., or Baton Rouge, which might absorb 2, 3, or 5 families a year, spend less for those families, because the absorption and aid of the emigres is a community venture, handled for the most part by volunteers...
...Still, the Israelis hope to find new ways of encouraging the Russians to come...
...We used to just have a sort of horse and buggy activity," she says, "with people donating things, odds and ends, pots and pans...
...But with the Federal block grant, aid can no longer be considered lent...
...But after that, families are billed on the basis of need...
...In each local Jewish community, the Council now helps to bring together a cooperative venture involving almost every Jewish organization, from the schools to the hospitals to the JCC...
...Back in the Stalin years, the dark years between 1948 and 1953, only 18 Jews were allowed to leave Russia...
...That is 150 people who must be seen as long and as often as they need help...
...According to everyone in Chicago, James Rice, director of the Chicago Federation, is a prince...
...The UJA works a bit like a national franchise...
...HIAS is considering this compromise...
...Sure," David Hersh says, "there's no problem on the local level, everyone's gung ho...
...Add in hidden costs and the figure might be closer to $100 million...
...the typical Moscow and Leningrad Jews coming out now have very little Jewish experience...
...And they must be made to feel at home in Judaism, as well...
...Or, instead of financing for four or five months, for just three months...
...Ask about policy, about details and costs, and you will have cause to remember, by and by, the three blind men and the elephant...
...One man describes a tree...
...Few melting pots are comfortable to melt in...
...In Bangor, Maine, with a Jewish population of about 1,000, the resettlement process is intimate and warm...
...They get by through the dedication of their staff, professional and volunteer...
...In Israel, the Jewish Agency expects to spend an additional $14.5 million this year to cover the increasing numbers settling there...
...But they liked the people in Bangor, and liked the small town...
...This has been, and remains, a controversial point...
...But as costs and numbers grew higher, the Council of Jewish Federations got into the act...
...Privately, many officials feel that for the UJA to fund the absorption of Soviets to this country is immoral...
...Most officials, from the White House to HIAS, felt that the parole visa was appropriate and could have been issued much sooner, but the Attorney General procrastinated until April...
...the third, a snake...
...These earlier groups had come mostly from the provinces, and had a strong Jewish identity...
...The parole visa goes back 30 or 40 years: it is a device whereby we can parole people into the U.S...
...Especially since now, close to 90 percent are recent family reunion cases...
...David Hersh, of the United Jewish Appeal, says, "Local officials, Federation people, will tell you that Israel is lucky they aren't all going, that Israel couldn't afford them...
...Almost all of the refugees leave the Soviet Union on Israeli visas...
...would not be given aid to come here: they would be forced, in effect, to choose Israel...
...The $16 million of the block grant which will be used for the Soviets will help provide for 16,000 people...
...Public dollars: the United States appropriated a block grant of $20 million to help Americans resettle refugees this year...
...The professionals all work overtime, and they are trying any shortcut that might save time without cutting the quality of the service...
...The Israelis would be pleased— and many of us here in the U.S...
...But there is much more than economics involved here...
...And in Israel, of course, inflation is outrageous...
...One way to economize at the local level would be to give less— simply give each family some fraction of what it would have received...
...So we really have no choice...
...And they are the only major city in the country which has drawn on its reserves rather than take resettlement funds from the national UJA...
...That has caused a two percent population increase, which is not insignificant, especially for a Midwestern community which had been losing population to zero population growth and to the Sun Belt...
...Just dip into the pot and take out $100,000 from UJA____Well, thank God the money's available...
...The UJA says we have no choice, whatever the cost, but the money should be raised in addition to funds for existing programs, so that we do not borrow from Peter to pay Paul...
...And that was OK in 1977, with just nine families...
...This is not so easy...
...From where else in the world might we see a vast aliyahl Certainly not America...
...A bill now in Congress provides for a block grant next year of $36 million, of which some $30 million might be used for the Soviet refugees...
...As HIAS points out, "It is much easier to call Jewish businessmen in a place like Kansas City and say, 'Can you find a job for a Russian?' than it is in New York...
...Those who do go to Israel (about one-third last year) go to a camp run by the Jewish Agency, and they can be in Israel within 48 hours...
...Chicago has on its staff two children (now in their thirties) of Soviet immigrants from the 60's...
...As we shall see, that depends on whom you ask...
...as well—if the Russians chose to go to Israel...
...When somebody got an allocation of 2 eggs a week, they will tell you, it was a luxury...
...The Jewish Agency says we should help them, encourage them to come to Israel, closing off other choices...
...Problem: In the day schools, teachers are having trouble with the adolescent kids...
...The entire take of local federation campaigns last year was about $470 million, of which national UJA received a little more than $260 million...
...They ran a round-the-clock employment bureau and a Yiddish monthly...
...Recently Dulzin, of the Jewish Agency, proposed a compromise...
...That was one thing...
...No more long, formal letters pass between Chicago and HIAS...
...But there is a ceiling: the grant provides only for a maximum payment of $1,000 per individual...
...Of the 50,000 expected to leave Russia this year, more than two-thirds will probably opt for America...
...Chicago used to take 100 a month, and thought that was hard on their staff...
...And next year, perhaps as many, perhaps more...
...The conventional estimate is that it costs about $6,500 to settle a family here, and $65,000 to settle one in Israel...
...These include the International Refugee Committee, the Tolstoy Foundation, Caritas (a Catholic organization), and others...
...Against such a figure, the $16 million provided to the Soviet refugees by the block grant will not prevent an incredible crunch on the American Jewish community...
...We used to be reuniting relatives who had not met in 30 years, who never expected to meet again...
...And for English training, the JVS works with the City College system, which provides language teachers to the Soviets for free...
...Fifty thousand Jews are being helped, and comforted, and given homes this year...
...the second, a rock...
...In May, we got 18 families—51 people...
...With inflation, and the pressure of the influx, all costs seem to rise...
...Eventually, we may see a large aliyah of younger Russian emigres in America as well, especially as they unlearn the distorted information they were provided, back in the USSR, regarding conditions in Israel...
...The big contributors all over the country will wake up and say, 'You mean only 45 percent of my money is going overseas?' " At the most liberal estimate, 50,000 emigres will exit the Soviet Union this year, and from 25 to 33,000 will choose to come to the United States...
...Problem: Caseworkers are noticing a higher percentage of sick people, old people, people with cancer and cardiovascular diseases...
...In the decade after Stalin, with Krushchev in the Kremlin, a little better than 2,000 Jews were allowed to leave...
...or in Israel but to help, whatever the cost...
...Surprising in such a political animal as the Soviet Union that they did not think of it...
...Then (in an unrelated development) the backlog in Rome continued to build while everyone waited for the Attorney General to issue them the so-called "parole visa" so that they might be admitted to the U.S...
...Local federations use the UJA name—and Israel's appeal—in their local campaigns, and in return they forward some percentage of their take to UJA, the rest being reserved for local or national agencies...
...Now we have families, parents and children, who parted only one or two years ago, who broke up temporarily to make the trip out...
...The cost of housing is lower...
...The communities spend far more than that $2,000, though, when one adds in hidden costs: scholarships at Day Schools (which cannot be applied to a federal grant because of the separation of church and state...
...200 million is much less than they need...
...Recently they took teenagers, who were backed up in Rome, for tours of Israel, hoping the children would be impressed and would relay their impressions to their families in Rome...
...And because of the costs of administering the grant, the communities receive somewhat less than the full $1,000 in reimbursement...
...In most communities, the funds used for the Russian resettlement are now being subtracted from the money that would ordinarily go to the national UJA, and thence on to Israel...
...Israel, on the other hand, has to start from scratch—building new houses and new schools for the new arrivals...
...These Jews must be greeted, and processed, and escorted, and transported, and greeted again in their new home countries...
...Many don't speak a word of English and become very depressed...
...A year ago they had six on their staff, and now they have 16—to handle up to 2,000 refugees...
...Wearing blue caps on which the Yiddish letters for HIAS had been embroidered, representatives worked on the Island as mediators between the immigrants and the Ellis Island officials...
...HIAS, of course, has been in this business a long time, almost a century...
...But for each refugee, the first stop is the city of Vienna...
...Why should programs in Israel suffer because we want—or feel obliged—to take a hundred more Soviet Jews into New York City...
...Politically," says one Federation man, "the Soviet Union missed the boat if it wanted Israel to die...
...We have not stood aside and let them flounder...
...The Federations say we have no choice in the U.S...
...Though HIAS now provides most of the assistance to the Jewish immigrants in Vienna, there are other organizations which would help the Soviet Jews come to America if HIAS or JDC were not there...
...The first couple now owns a home with a swimming pool in Burlington...
...How well are we managing...
...With inflation, the local drives have to raise much more than their previous figures to stay even—and many have raised less...
...In the early years, small communities rarely saw them, and in the large cities the Jewish Family and Children's Service was the sole group which worked with HIAS on the stateside resettlement...
...I still remember when we had only one family coming in at a time, and it was kind of lonely, in retrospect...
...Technically, the money is earmarked for refugees from all countries (with the exception of the Cubans and the Indo-chinese, who are handled by separate legislation...
...And everywhere, the refugees are met with skill and with remarkable organization, the coordinated effort of many agencies...
...In Chicago, they do get three CETA slots for people who work with the refugees...
...We are faced—and suddenly—with the largest Jewish refugee problem in 25 years...
...Now it must be the relatives who show new arrivals around Chicago...
...government and in part by the American Jewish community...
...But nowadays, the joke runs, a Russian walks off the plane holding up two V's, and the V's don't stand for victory: they mean "I demand a villa and a Volvo...
...That would have swamped Israel in a year and drained every charitable dollar out of the United States...
...In fact, though, almost all of the grant—$16 million—goes to the East European and Soviet refugees...
...They must be made comfortable and given the opportunity—as rapidly as possible—to make themselves useful...
...Hotels can no longer be found for every new arrival, and the JFCS now insists that their relatives take them in at the start...
...Probably, too, the release of refugees is calculated to improve the Soviet image for the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow...
...Within six months the man's brother came, with his family...
...The money for the stateside resettlement of these emigres comes from two main sources...
...Certainly they have reasons, subtle reasons, for their measured generosity...
...In the end, the story goes far beyond budgets, details, and hassles...
...So, like Bangor, they manage a warm resettlement...
...The Soviet Union, even to those who second-guess it best, is a black box without a key, and its inner works are mysteries...
...RAVTOV, besides being tiny, is totally opposed to Israel: it is allied with the Satmar Chassidim, militant anti-Zionists...
...The UJA gets about $260 million a year, of which some $200 million goes to Israel...
...Some cities do try to cover the rising costs by drawing on their own reserves or endowments...
...The service can no longer be quite as personal in Louisville...
...And then the brother of that couple...
...Some—perhaps three or four cities—are trying to raise the extra funds in special campaigns...
...Along with the influx, they have been able to broaden their base of volunteers, and through the block grant they've added a full time teacher, and a vocational counselor, and a full time interpreter, to their staff...
...many stay on the rolls for much longer...
...The refugees bound for America are maintained in Rome by HIAS while the U.S...
...Jerry Williams, head of the local federation, who runs the Emple Knitting Mills in Bangor, can tell you about every family they've taken in...
...In New York, which has already settled 20,000, the emigres form a very noticeable group in the city...
...It keeps a little lame old woman outside the HIAS office hissing to those going in that it would give the refugees more money...
...They know the desperation of apartment hunters...
...Some need extensive medical care, which is a frightening experience at the best of times...
...The current exodus of Jews from the Soviet Union should be good news, news for rejoicing, a matter for simple happiness, like the parting of clouds...
...Talk to anyone in the national UJA and you hear the same angry story...
...But it is not easy...
...The percentage they forward varies from community to community...
...Theirs is a rough age to be pulled out of community and country and dumped down in a new place...
...at all...
...But in 1978, 28,000 Jews left...
...In this country, we can simply move over and make room for the refugees—or try to...
...They must be resettled and retrained...
...As everyone has heard by now, a growing proportion of the emigres are choosing the United States over Israel...
...But with the kind of influx we face now, it is no longer clear whether Israel would gain or lose by the exchange...
...Israel needs manpower, and a large proportion of the Soviets are highly skilled...
...You call a guy in New York and say you have a Russian looking for a job and he'll say, 'What else is new?' " Also, in large cities support services (handled through agencies) cost, while smaller cities use volunteers and depend more heavily on personal contacts, even for things like furniture, dishes, clothing...
...Not a large number either, when one thinks of the nearly 3,000,000 Soviet Jews who were forced to remain behind...
...I answer that: Let them be unlucky...
...There is already a sizable emigre community here (50,000 recent soviet emigres), so many of the Jews in Rome can be reunited with mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers ("first-level reunions") in America...
...The new case worker, Anita Goldin, used to be a volunteer...
...In Chicago, every caseworker has two phones, and could use three hearts...
...This is at least a constructive use of their time, and helps prepare them for life in the U.S...
...There is even an independent little Jewish agency, RAVTOV, which is authorized to spend U.S...
...In some cities, the CETA program pays for English classes, and even provides maintenance while the Russians take the class (CETA pays because the class furthers their readiness for the job market...
...Some lived in shacks...
...In the years to come, the JFCS will doubtless have a lot of counselling to do...
...But on the local level, at least, we are managing well...
...In a town like Bangor, Jerry Williams admits, there are limited opportunities for professionals, except at the entry level...
...in many cases, highly educated...
...And they have three Soviet staff members who are recent immigrants...
...Because the loss of an individual who would have moved to Israel is a far greater loss than Israel's gain of $65,000...
...It is as if we had occupied Cape Cod...
...And since they don't, we have to take care of them...
...There are Jewish dollars, and public dollars (and we're not talking here about such services as Social Security or unemployment compensation, for which the refugee's may qualify after some time...
...Twenty thousand dollars multiplied by 20,000 people is $400 million...
...They could not be supported there in such numbers...
...Another complicating factor is that there is considerable popular resentment towards the refugees in Israel, chiefly because of Israel's housing shortage...
...You can't keep accomplished engineers working as draftsmen...
...beyond the niggling questions of how to slice the pie...
...In Chicago (Jewish population 253,000) they've settled 3,000 emigres since the early 1970's, and at least 1,500 are expected to arrive this year...
...HIAS asks each newcomer to sign a note agreeing to pay back some fraction of his transportation expenses (usually $600...
...sometimes they hit bottom...
...We still won't get more than $ 1,000 apiece, though—and we won't get that unless we have the numbers flowing from the Soviet Union...
...Now they had to think in terms of 50 sofas, 150 lamps, 300 chairs...
...Relatives show them how to use the supermarket, the bank, the hospital...
...Even if only one-third choose to go to Israel, which is the present rate, that's a lot for Israel to handle...
...The school is funded largely by the U.S...
...We would pick up four or five families at the airport at a time...
...Under these circumstances, how could Israel possibly absorb more...
...That is a complicated question, and perhaps it is too early in the day for answers...
...We can draw our own conclusions: the Soviets may deliberately be issuing them visas in preference to the young, letting the sick be treated in Israel or the U.S...
...They come back to visit...
...They had 20 apartments rented, ready and waiting...
...But the present Attorney General feels that the parole visa was intended not for groups but for individuals only, and that something else must be worked out...
...instead of the USSR...
...Then came the second couple's mother and grandmother...
...The immigrants' sense of self-worth always suffers badly upon arrival here...
...But on the local level, the picture really is simple, in the end: the embrace of landsman and landsman, mother and daughter...
...Of all the reputations we have earned in 2,000 years (most of them unearned, most scurrilous) it has always been acknowledged that "the Jews take care of their own...
...Now, of course, to clear up that backlog HIAS has to move out many more and much faster than before, because still more Jews arrive in Rome every day...
...Meanwhile, 10,000 refugees backed up in Rome...
...Just why they are being allowed out, no one really knows...
...In the early years Israel had been their overwhelming choice, and there are still many more Soviet immigrants there than here (150,000 to 50,000...
...Watching the behavior of the new Russians, old-timers recall their own resettlement with, some bitterness...
...UJA says that for these and other reasons, their percentage has been dropping to a shocking level in the last few years: 51 to 52 percent is all UJA gets, and they see that only over a period of two or three years, because their money is not immediately collectable...
...The international picture is complex, the national picture is complex, the issues divisive...
...And why should Jewish programs in New York City suffer...
...If we want to encourage the refugees to get more involved Jewishly—and most of these people are nonreli-gious, with a high rate of intermarriage among them—then doing well by them is a matter of self-interest as well as conscience...
...government processes their visa applications, and while HIAS matches them up with a suitable city or town in this country...
...Providing these until the emigre family is self-sufficient can be frightfully expensive...
...At one time in May they were renting everything they could get their hands on in Louisville...
...One sees a certain amount of resentment in every country, with every wave of new immigrants...
...And in America, they strove to place immigrants with their relatives—relatives who might have arrived only a few months earlier, but who already could show a greenhorn the ropes...
...It is true: by and large we are people of conscience...
...Now' they have 250 to 300 a month...
...Problem: To save money, the federal government, and HIAS as well, are trying to process people more quickly in Europe...
...What they really should have done is open their doors wide open and let all the Jews out at once—//they were all headed for Israel...
...above and beyond the annual quota for immigrants) if in the Attorney General's opinion they are being persecuted for religious or political reasons...
...Some may send in as much as 80 percent of their take, others as little as 45 percent...
...And they had furniture in a warehouse, and more in somebody's basement...
...If the American Jewish community wants to settle them, they argue, it should fund the enterprise, but not at the expense of existing programs...
...The organization was founded in an East Side store by a lands-manshaft that wanted to give a decent burial to Jews who died on Ellis Island...
...And some Russians 'walk in' to Chicago from other cities—about ten a month—looking for work (they need help coping with the anxieties of re-resettlement...
...by and large, we help each other out...
...And the numbers are rising fast...
...free medical care at Jewish hospitals...
...In fact, the details of the resettlement are not simple, and the issues involved admit no easy consensus...
...But in the greater perspective of the Diaspora, the migration of the Soviet refugees cannot mean anything but fortune, surely...
...So many of the emigres have moved to Boston...
...Otherwise the Federation would be guilty of double-dipping the grant: receiving reimbursement both from the government and the newcomers...
...Probably the Soviets hope to better their chances for trade agreements, and for most-favored-nation status, with the United States...
...Currently, behind closed doors, the resettlement is a subject of dispute, a dispute that can only grow more bitter in the coming months as the numbers of refugees rise...
...Those going to the U.S...
...In medium sized communities too, the costs for resettlement are less than in the largest cities...
...Bangor started two years ago with their first Russian family, a man and wife and one child...
...With a mammoth caseload, and a very difficult one, they are still able to give personalized service to each refugee...
...For one thing, when there is a big increase in a city of Chicago's size, housing dries up, and the landlords get wind of it and raise rents...
...Then there are the other services which each community provides its emigres: language training, vocational training, medical aid, tutoring, "acculturation classes" at the synagogue and the JCC...
...Certainly in most communities money is very, very tight this year...
...One Federation director, who understands the regrets of Israeli officials, says the local communities really have no choice any more...
...And Lee Haag, of the JFCS, was a refugee herself...
...And this year some say as many as 50,000 Jews will leave the Soviet Union...
...All those who did not have first-level reunions in the U.S...
...The strain begins in Europe...
...But is all this at the expense of existing programs...
...In Louisville, Kentucky, with a Jewish population of just under 10,000, there is a strong commitment from volunteers, and they will settle 140 refugees this year, which is a big number for a community that size...
...and Canada, or elsewhere, are shepherded by the Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) and the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) from Vienna to Rome, using funds provided in part by the U.S...
...And Chicago—like many cities—had in recent years also begun asking that some of its aid be considered as a loan...
...Hard to say...
...Recent arrivals repaid Chicago some $100,000 last year, which can now be recycled to new immigrants...
...Finding a job for him in Bangor was a problem, but he settled eventually...
...Where there are no relatives to meet, HIAS looks instead for a suitable job market— Houston for an oil engineer, Bangor for a paper engineer...
...Hard to see the whole picture...
...These days it's a quick note or a phone call: "Sure, we'll take them, send them on...
...And in Israel, the 20,000 or so new arrivals will cost considerably more than $2,000 per individual— some say as much as $20,000...
...But the vast majority simply dip into the funds targetted for overseas aid— that is, UJA...
...Officials at HIAS say that Chicago is a miracle for service...
...In Chicago, about 3,500 emigres have now settled...
...As the numbers of emigres have increased, the responsibility for the resettlement program has shifted...
...Instead of saying, "Oh dear, someone has a toothache, let's make an appointment," they're starting to think in terms of group exams once a month...
...So they were given a certain amount to live on, and most went to little resort towns outside Rome where they could find inexpensive apartments...
...time contributed by countless volunteers...
...Can we do less now, in the face of such plain need...
...government funds...
...They had once collected donated furniture door to door...
...On the local level, we are managing and we are improvising—although not without strain...
...Ask around almost any Jewish community in the United States, and you find that the number of refugees being resettled has risen dramatically: according to the Council of Jewish Federations, from 775 to 1,200 in one city, from 238 to 400 in another, and in others from 514 to 1,000, from 77 to 150, from 7 to 50...
...This proviso has been used to apply to individuals, and also to populations: it was applied to the Cubans, the Indochinese, and to other groups of Jews as well...
...But not everyone agrees...
...In other words, the communities are reimbursed only for half of the first $2,000 they spend per individual...
...It is three to six months, on the average, before a family is minimally self-sufficient...
...But that can be hard, too, JFCS admits—if you have only a one bedroom apartment, things get crowded fast...
...The Soviet Jews will make important contributions wherever they are...
...But it appears that at least 25,000— and perhaps as many as 33,OQO— will be arriving here in this Federal fiscal year...
...This year, in February alone we got six families, and that seemed like a great big number to people in the office...
...How significant is this resentment...
...Besides—though one does not want to sound self-serving—we hope these people will eventually become integrated within the Jewish community...
...They are increasing their expenditures through special allocations to local agencies, and the block grant helps, but that still won't cover everything...
...The biggest item in every local budget is the cost of "direct maintenance," the provision of the necessities: bread, clothing, and the landlord's rent...
...HIAS steered the immigrants into their new country and helped them dodge the swindlers of the East Side, who had bridges to sell...
...These days, each caseworker carries an incredible load: 85 family units per worker...
...Jewish dollars: The money for the Soviet Jews comes out of moneys raised in the annual campaign of the United Jewish Appeal, conducted locally by autonomous Federations...
...Or, instead of helping the immigrants until they have found jobs appropriate to their skills, helping them for just a short time and letting them take any work: let a doctor work in a drugstore...
...It was not set up to do that, they say...
...That's 90 percent of our cases here...
...Eighteen Jews—a handful of families, too small to fill a single bus, almost too small to be counted in the history of the Diaspora, a history full of mass escapes and mass migrations...
...And by 1914 they had an office in Washington DC and had learned how to pressure the government, keeping American ports from closing to the flood of immigrants...
...The grant is of the matching type: in theory, it pays back each local Jewish community 50e for every dollar the community spends this year on the resettlement...
...Do we encourage them to do so if we just say, coldly, "We'll help you for only a month...
...The story is about 50,000 Jews—so far...
...government, but it ran out of money recently, and HIAS is bailing it out with its own cash— HIAS had to borrow 1 million dollars at 12 percent interest to cover the cost...
...They badgered European shipping lines to provide better steerage conditions...
...Meanwhile it is summer, and thousands of Italians returning to their favorite resorts are unable to Find apartments...
...If we spend $2,000 per individual, the resettlement in the United States alone will cost anywhere from $50 to $66 million...
Vol. 4 • July 1979 • No. 7
