BUDGET CUTS page 111
budget will remain hopelessly
out of reach.
The president's proposal rep-
resents only the opening move in
a legislative chess game that will
be shaped to a considerable de-
gree by the Republican-led Con-
gress. The coming months will
see the sharpest exchanges yet
over exactly which programs to
cut the most, and which groups
of constituents will feel the brunt
of the pain.
Welfare programs, already
slashed by last year's welfare re-
form bill, are almost certain to be
pared back even more. Jewish ac-
tivists helped avert big cuts in
subsidized housing for the elder-
ly in the last Congress; this time,
the battle will be harder.
Efforts to help Medicare and
Medicaid survive into the next
century will — at the very least
— result in diminished services,
higher costs and new problems
for service providers.
Jewish leaders are far from
panicking, but they see a ripple
effect in the offing. Cuts in ser-
vices will throw more clients into
the arms of Jewish agencies just
as those agencies face declining
federal grants.
Jewish organizations • fared
better than some observers pre-
dicted after the Republican rev-
olution of 1994.
'.."'mr" •
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To plant trees, call
1-800-542-TREE
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our effort ... but
we're realistic."
...or call your local JNF office.
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"First, there was a lot of wish-
ful thinking that it was all just
talk, and that nothing would re-
ally change," said an official with
a major Jewish group. "Then, we
panicked; there was a feeling that
our communal structure might
crash down in ruins.
"What really happened was
somewhere in between; we are
seeing significant problems re-
sulting from the budget cuts, but
we are coping better than most
of us expected. In many ways, the
community has really risen to the
challenge."
Jewish groups will continue to
cope in the months to come by
moving simultaneously on three
fronts.
In Washington, organizations
such as the Council of Jewish
Federations will continue to ad-
vocate on behalf of endangered
social safety net programs, and
press for moderation when Con-
gress and the administration ad-
dress the big three entitlements
— Medicare, Medicaid and Social
Security.. Changes in Medicaid,
in particular, could have a dra-
matic impact_on Jewish hospi-
tals, nursing homes, mental
health clinics and services for the
elderly.
At the same time, Jewish
groups are becoming more active
at the state and local levels as fed-
eral programs are turned over to
the states, and as smaller local
programs try to make up for fed-
eral service cuts.
"The focus has shifted very
much to the state level, where a
lot of the decisions about services
will now be made," said Arthur
Abramson, executive director of
the Baltimore Jewish Council.
"We're not giving up our effort to
get the welfare and immigration
regulations changed at the fed-
eral level, but we're realistic; we're
begirming to focus on dealing with
the consequences of federal de-
cision-making."
The object of that activity is to
make sure critical Jewish popu-
lations — the elderly, the infirm,
the incapacitated, immigrants —
continue to receive vital services.
And Jewish groups are push-
ing harder to develop alternative
funding sources, both govern-
mental and philanthropic, for ser-
vices that face decreasing federal
contributions.
Jewish leaders concede that
their organizations have to be-
come far more efficient as feder-
al money dries up and as the
demand for services increases.
But even as it becomes more ef-
ficient, the Jewish communal
world needs to expand to meet the
increased demand created by big
federal cutbacks. Managing that
combination — more and bigger
programs, but also more efficient
ones, with more diverse funding
sources — will be a bureaucratic
high-wire act for Jewish leaders.
Jewish groups need to become
more politically pragmatic. As the
105th Congress convenes, there
are indications that this change
is well under way.
Two years ago, Jewish activists
responded to the arrival of the
Gingrich Congress by resisting
the concept of deficit reduction as
a top national priority; in 1997,
many now accept the inevitabili-
ty of a smaller and less active gov-
ernment, especially as the Clinton
administration seeks a bipartisan
consensus on deficit reduction.
The key, Jewish leaders agree,
will be to work with leaders of
both parties to get the best deal
for America's neediest popula-
tions, and for vulnerable groups
of Jews in particular.
The real story of the second
Clinton administration may be
the growing bipartisanship of the
balanced budget movement. Giv-
en that reality, Jewish groups
that stubbornly cling to big-gov-
ernment liberalism will be squan-
dering resources.
Instead, as many Jewish lead-
ers have concluded in recent
months, they need to participate
in the movement for fiscal
restraint — and bring to it their
traditional commitment to fair-
ness and a compassionate
government. ❑