New York – A coalition of 15 groups in New York City is seeking $1.5 million in City Council funding to help the 30,000 Holocaust survivors who are living at or below the poverty level in New York City, Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester.
Join our WhatsApp groupSubscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
Meredith Burak, chair of public-private partnerships for the Survivor Initiative, a nonprofit agency that organized the fundraising efforts, says the money would be helpful to assist those who need help with medical, food and emergency needs, reports the Wall Street Journal (http://on.wsj.com/1AmjAMh).
According to Selfhelp, a nonprofit that helps Holocaust survivors, about half of all living Holocaust survivors live in New York and three of the surrounding counties.
Many survivors live alone and many others suffer from medical issues that can be traced to malnutrition and torture during WWII. Trauma was revived for some when they lost their homes during the Sept. 11 attacks and Superstorm Sandy.
The city provided some funding from 2005 to 2008 specifically for Holocaust survivor services, but assistance was revoked during the recession.
It’s estimated that survivors need about $5,000 per year to cover food, medical and emergency needs. The UJA-Federation of New York, the largest organization that assists survivors, serves about 13,000 survivors. Meeting the needs of all 30,000 survivors would require $85 million annually.
Elihu Kover, vice president for Nazi victim services at Selfhelp, estimates that its 5,200 clients range in age from 70 to 105 years old. Demographic data supplied by Selfhelp forecasts that 23,000 survivors will be alive by 2025 in New York.
City Council member Mark Levine says no one can undo the trauma of war, but that the city can help the survivors live out their final years with dignity.
I’m all in favor of helping Holocaust survivors.
But this smells of a scam the likes of which we saw with the Metropolitan Council. New York, Westchester and Nassau are among the most expensive counties in the U.S. and yet we’re supposed to believe that most of the seniors living there are below the poverty line.
Moreover, these seniors already receive social security and medicare and in case of poverty: welfare, medicaid, housing (in addition to reparations from Germany or Hungary.) Furthermore, many of the ‘poor’ survivors have signed over their assets to family members to facilitate obtaining government benefits because they qualify as indigent. (not unheard of).
1.5 million for 30,000 is about $50 a person !!, sounds like money for bureaucracy more than for survivors.