'TgIVOMMIOWI:
So, What Happened
To The Merger?
PHIL JACOBS EDITOR
I
t's an issue that's not exactly off the
back burner. The consolidation of
four ofJudaism's most powerful or-
ganizations is more likely to simmer
in the near future than reach a boil.
It was only last February that repre-
sentatives of over 100 Jewish federa
tions voiced their opinions in Fort
Lauderdale over the possible merger of
the United Jewish Appeal (UJA), the
United Israel Appeal (UIA), the Amer-.
ican Jewish Joint Distribution Com-
mittee (JDC) and the Council ofJewish
Federations (CJF).
The reasons given for consolidation
are mostly business related. It just
makes more sense to consolidate agency
services that often overlap.
When the meeting was held in the win-
ter, there was talk of division over any
merger. Indeed, one federation executive,
calling it a "civil war of sorts," predicted
that major cities would pull out of CJF.
"The time has come to look at these
possible partnerships," newly installed
CJF president Dr. Conrad Giles said
"It's clear that there will be an incre
mental change in the way we conduct
business. The ability to forge a part-
nership with UJA could streamline our
leadership. Our system has to somehow
respond to the reality of an enormous
Jewish community. If there is a part-
nership, then a trust occurs, which en-
ables us to work from one organization.
The vast majority of cities want to have
something happen."
Marty Kraar, the executive director
of CJF, concurred with Dr. Giles in his
assessment of the merger.
"We are already good partners with
UJA," said Mr. K.raar. "We are looking
to bring ourselves together to stream-
line things. It would really minimize the
duplication by working together."
Benjamin D. Kuntz, chairman of the
Associated: Jewish Community Fed-
eration of Baltimore, also felt positive
about the merger.
"I think for the best interests of
the Jewish communities of the Diaspo-
ra, a merger of one sort or another
should take place. It's important that
we maintain the ability to disburse the
funds, and not continue to allow'desig-
nated giving, which disburses funds to
the sexy programs. Also, a merger of
UJA and CJF will allow us to better al-
locate money to the range of Jewish
needs."
The four organization.s have more
than 300 employees and budgets total
ing over $38 million.
CJF acts as the representative body
of the 189 North American Jewish fed-
erations. The UJA collects from the fed
erations for overseas needs such as
Operation Exodus, which paid for the
airlift of hundreds of Jews from the for
mer Soviet Union to Israel. Then the
UJA allocates the money to either the
T.TIA, which funds programs in Israel,
or the JDC, which funds programs
around the world, except in Israel and
North America.
The federations have been reducing
the percentage of their annual cam-
paigns that they allocate to the UJA
in recent years. The national average
"WSi.....15'SV4WV E
t5M. „ 111k.,
now stands at about 40 percent The
U.S. federations gave the UJA $797 mil-
hon last year $23 million less than what
they gave in 1989.
Critics of the current system have
noted that it has too much duplication,
excess bureaucracy and waste.
Barry Shrage, president of the Com-
bined Jewish Philanthropies of Boston,
is cautious in his approval plan.
"I think there can be an acceptable
plan," said Mr. Shrage. "Most people, I
think, feel it would be beneficial to
merge UJA and CJF. What hung some
people up was the content o f the pro
posed merger. A critical question was,
what is this new organization for? What
are the key aims and goals of this new
organization?
'The truth is that there hasn't been
much [thought given to that]," he said
'The No 1 issue was, how does power
get divided? Who controls what?
"But at this particular moment in
Jewish history, the creation of a new
reason for Jewish life [is] an issue some
people felt should take precedence, and
that while were working on the key lo-
gistical issues sinrounding the merger,
there ought to be another group simul-
taneously creating a strategic vision for
the future of the American Jewish com-
munity." El
Thousands of Jevvish activists come together to Invent the Jewish community of the future.
DAVID CONN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
L
ast week's General Assembly of
the Council of Jewish Federations
was a one-week slice of organized
Jewish life with constituents from
all segments of the community arguing
for
. t,heir interests; internationalists warn-
mg not to forget Israel, and Russia, and
Bosnia; and religious and secular Jews
alike gravely asking, 'Where's the spir-
ituality?"
But if the conference, with its nearly
3,000 participants, provided the usual
fare of fund-raising advice, technical sem-
inars and tedious speeches, it surely of
fered something else far more important
It was a chance for the most active and
interested segments of North American
Jewry to pep theinselves up and rein-
vigorate their lives' work of building the
Jewish community.
Nowhere was that spirit of renewal
seen more than among those attending
a keynote speech by Arnold Eisen, a
Stanford University religious studies pro-
fessor. His talk on the "North American
Jewish Community of the Future" was
itself the talk of the conference for a lime.
His warning was stern, but familiar:
"There will not be many Jews in North
David Conn is the assistant editor of our
sister publication, the Baltimore Jew-
ish Times.
America a generation or two from now
unless we re-imagine and reconstruct
our communities, and there will not be
Jewish communities unless we revital-
ize and reinvigorate the teaching of
Torah, which alone can give shape and
purpose to those communities."
The Jewish community of the future
of which the federation can and must be
an integral part, Dr. Eisen maintained,
must overcome the forces tearing people
apart. The geographic, social, marital,
even political mobilities that have come
with Jewish acceptance in a secular
world have weakened the fabric of Jew-
ish life, he argued.
Dr. Eisen sketched an outline of a Jew
ish community of the future that can
meet the spiritual, social and emotion-
al needs of its members. It must be vol-
untary, certainly, and it must embrace
the multiple organizations and causes
that compete for its constituents' time
and loyalties.
It must be pluralistic, he insisted, re-
inforcing a central theme at the Gener-
al Assembly this year. "The fact ofJewish
diversity will continue to be inescapable
in this country," Dr.Eisen said. "Jews are
too different from one another to be sat-
isfied with one formula for communal ex-
pression ..."
These idealized communities must
operate on several levels: They must history "that is pointless, hence also pur-
be local enough to foster face-to-face poseless," he said.
relationships, such as those found in
For some, the challenges of a. world of
small congregations and chavurot, or Jewish attrition, of budget cuts and
small study or prayer groups. And they falling annual campaigns pose an op-
must be global enough to "unite Jews portunity that the Jewish people ignores
in the covenants of fate and destiny at its peril.
alike."
The old paradigm of Jewish life and
Justus important as the structure of federation fund-raising was an effective
the community, other Jewish leaders con- one, but its day is done, said Barry
tended, is the purpose. "What good is it Sluage, president of Boston's Combined
to gather young Jews in if we can't tell Jewish Philanthropies. The old model
them why?" asked Leonard Fein, clime- called on Jews to respond to peril and
tor of the Reform movement's Commis- need, and it offered "the great adventure"
sion on Social Action.
of the birth of the State of Israel.
"My friends, let me suggest to you that
But Jews, especially in North Ameri-
the principal enemy of Jewish continu- ca, no longer want to be seen solely as
ity in this country is not assimilation, victims, only able to act in rescue mode.
is not anti-Semitism., is not even inter- "I believe the next great paradigm is the
marriage," he told a small audience.
potential for creating a new golden age
"Our principal enemy is boredom."
for American Jewry, a golden age for
The answer to that boredom is a Jew- world Jewry," he told his fellow federa
ish life with meaning, with a mission, tion planners, "an intellectual age, a spir-
Mr. Fein said A devotion to social jus- itual age."
tice "enables us to say to our young that
In an interview before the convention.,
it is important that we survive in order before the most driven. of North Ameri-
to help mend this broken world," he can Jewry gathered to reassess their
said.
shared destiny, Mr. Shrage summed up
Mr. Fein and others urged the mod- the challenge: "Really, what's the point
ern Jewish world to reject the old view of this whole adventure if you're not
of "the Jewish saga as an endless cycle thinking about what it means to be Jew-
of disasters either actually experienced ish," he said, "and to be part of a Jew-
or narrowly averted." That view offers a ish community'?"
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