Jerusalem – The pre-Passover ritual of distributing food to the poor was disrupted this week by Social Affairs Minister Moshe Kahlon’s attack on the charities that hand out the food, sparking a heated debate about the role of Israel’s nonprofit sector.
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“I oppose this method of throwing boxes at people, taking pictures of them, getting them to stand in line, and soliciting donations at the expense of these unfortunate people,” Kahlon told Army Radio Monday. “Stop standing them in line at 5 and calling in TV crews. You want to give? Give secretly.”
Kahlon also criticized charity officials for what he said were their high salaries, and said the government must take action to make these charities superfluous by next year.
“The directors of the nonprofits are bringing in a salary of tens of thousands of shekels [a month] at the expense of the poor,” said Kahlon. “We must act so that by next year these nonprofits will be unnecessary.”
Hmmmm I dare say that there is some truth in what he says!
Make sure you read the full story in Haaretz before commenting. The Minister suggests a very viable alternative – vouchers that can be redeemed at specific shops. This is so much more sensible – you can choose what your family likes, buy as much as you need and not have too much, retain your pride. One huge Baal Tzedoko where I live did it that way this year and it was wonderful. IF, he can bring it to fruition it would be fantastic.
i threw the 50 lb carrots they gave me in garbage
NGO charities are all about business first for the management and then being altruistic and caring for the people they serve. Go to any charity organization and look at the salaries of the top managers that run these operations. It’s laughable that they manage to generate 6 figure salaries by “feeding the poor.” So photo-ops and advertisement is not going anywhere, it’s part of their marketing strategy to seek out more donors.
Socialist propaganda
If even one yiddeshe family in EY doesn’t have food for pesach this year, Kahlon will have committed one of the biggest aveyros one can imagine.
I believe that one of the reasons organizations give food packages is because they get wholesale pricing on their purchases.
So for $400 the organization can give the recipient more than the recipient can get at the grocery store with a $400 voucher or debit card.
while vouchers are a very nice way to give Tzedaka and some charities allocate some money towards that (like the one i work for) still the reason most if not all give food instead of giving everyone vouchers is because you can probably afford to give 10 times as many people food as giving them vouchers (cost price / wholesale price for food) as for the photo ops – it helps bring in donors which is a valid reason to do it – after all without those donors no one is getting anything whether food or vouchers
as for salary (not mine 🙂 most of those that make the big $$ get paid on commission which is an incentive to bring in more $$$ and before anyone complains how about looking in Shulchon Aruch and see what it says about taking and how much one can take for commission
There is no greater Avera than Halbonas Ponim. Embarrassing the poor by taking pictures of them and publishing it, is an Avera which far outweighs the Mitzvah of giving.
It’s understandable that an organization can get more for their $ by distributing food than by distributing vouchers but they must take these “boxes” and deliver them to the poor secretly and not torture the poor to wait on line for hours on end, as they do in Crown Heights.
C.H. should be ashamed of themselves to give Tzedaka in such disgusting and shameful way.
I have observed these lines in C.H. where the poor stand in the cold and in the rain for hours on end, while the Tzedaka Distributors take their time to count out 8 Lemons per family, 1 Potato Starch and 1 Sugar and 1 Oil etc.
At one of these communal Food Distribution places in C.H. on President Street near the corner of New York ave. they even ad insult to injury, that after people have been waiting on line for 5 hours in the cold and rain, he stops the line “cold Turkey” and lets them wait at a closed basement door, for another 2 hours, while he has to, now go to Daven Mincha and Maariv.
They don’t give a hoot to give it Bederech Kovod a BIG Avera!
The State knows full well that the haredi community exists on and because of tzedaka, both financially and spiritually. It follows that in their war to destroy that community, they should look for and eventually find a way to outlaw those charities. My warning to Mr Kahlon would be: be very careful what you say and do. There are many precedents to you philosophy. Many have tried before you and failed miserably, but the haredi community is still going strong.
yes here in manhattan all of the politicians who make big salaries, want their photos taken while the poor are getting packages such a chillul ha’shem
I’ve never hear of this Kahlon guy but have no doubts he is a liberal. Liberals are very uncomfortable with charity, they want everybody in need to go to the government to meet their needs and be dependent on the government. It is not different from our own Barack Hussein attempting to limit or preferably disallow charitable tax deductions
I believe that by giving vouchers the benefactors can give just as much because they no longer have to pay people to buy the stuff, pack it, deliver it etc. what they save on the manual labour they turn into voucher money too.