Your bloggers appreciate all of your Comments, even from those of you who believe that all we are doing is "....(airing our) dirty linen in public" or accusing us of "personal attack(s)." We note that none of our correspondents have questioned the facts that we have reported.
We want all of our readers to be assured that were there the opportunity for open and honest give and take within UJC, this Blog would not exist. When the most senior of professionals at UJC pushed back, look at the humiliation they suffered to the point of resignation; when lay leaders have pushed back, they have been relegated to the outside looking in. The doors at UJC are closed to any criticism. We have sat in silence for too long to be cowed by those who write that we are "uncivil" and need to "move on to another agency." When any organization, and certainly UJC, is essentially run by one professional and a single lay leader, any criticism will be perceived as "personal." When we find that UJC has once again become a place -- as were CJF and UJA, as we have come to learn -- where debate and discussion are welcomed, this Blog will cease to exist.
We will continue to welcome all of your Comments. If debate isn't permitted within UJC (ask those who were summoned to New York last March, ostensibly to "discuss" the "Organizational Strategy," only to be told they could ask questions but there would be no changes), then, perhaps, as Tateh, Jon and chai suggest by their Comments, debate can take place here.
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9 comments:
I read your postings with great sadness because I know they are true. We know Howard and Joe are taking us down the wrong path. There are many people in federations that are trying to make changes. Don't give up
The issue, to me, is what does UJC bring to the party as valued added for their 'owners' in exchange for the enormous (to me, bloated) overhead the 'partners' are assessed. An answer, at least as it relates to the larger Federations, is not very much. Creeping expansion, like the vaunted office in Washington or the attempt to establish operations in Israel, seem to have been simply mandated, without regard to whether they presented any value to the 'owners,' and, it would seem, without regard to costs. The rumored rebellion from some major Federations about dues increases may force change at UJC, but otherwise, it seems to me, it is simply another self-perpetuating bureaucracy. Thank you, boy and girls, for the inside scoop, but, less the gory details, it seems much the same on the outside.
Dear DJC,
Would you be interested in doing an anonymous interview on my blog? (I'm thinking three to five simple questions about what you are doing and why.) You would have full power of editing and review. I think you have an important perspective and know you are getting plenty of attention now, but perhaps a wider audience would behoove your purposes.
Maya Norton
The New Jew: Blogging Jewish Philanthropy
You can reach me at mayan80 [at] yahoo.com
Unfortunatley the anonymous author of this blog seems to have forgotten the primary raison d'etre for the merger of UJA and CJF. That was that the system was not functioning. UJC was supposed to represent a "new beginning" but unfortunately too many of the old guard leadership at UJA never let that happen. UJC was never allowed to be that new entity that merged functions but, in fact, was two organizations that were never in synch. Howard and the UJC leadership are finally cleaning house, a process that is never pretty. They have cut the budget and devleoped a strategic vision which had been lacking since the merger. The old guard of UJA doesn't want to let go. How sad!
chai is right...uja veterans are the problem...they miss the days when their budget was a non-transparent slush fund, swept off the top of overseas allocations, without any federation or lay leaders knowing how much was taken and what it was used for...times have changed...if uja was so perfect, why did the system force it to merge? perhaps some big mouths should go bother people at the john marshall law school alumni association...where they can take a real willy loman organization (4th rate law school) and drive it into the ground....just leave us kids alone and let us try to help people in peace...
i meant chai is wrong and wise is right; sorry all these fake names confuse me; must be familiar to our host since it is like all the shell corporations that real estate lawyers create in order to screw people; some great book that must be...
The Boys and Girls are doing an impressive job and if they need to post "blind" so be it. The issues need to be on the table. But it should be "our table". Meaning those who come to eat should be the worker bees, helpers (paid or not) and those who truly care.
Interviews, or call them whatever, should not be on blogs with broad distribution. The result will be off the wall comments from know-it-alls who are really only interested in self promotion. Just take a look at some posts and comments and judge for yourself.
And the blogger who granted "full power of editing and review". Guess she is a devotee of the Dick Cheney School of Journalism. If she is allowing editing by the boys and girls, she can post her questions right here. We don't need to be carrying on discussions on multiple blogs. After all, we are all trying to better our community. We are not in hiding, but we do not need to be on the front oage of the NYT either.
page (need to watch those typos).
Ari,
My blog is hardly a huge media conglomerate with tremendous circulation. Glad that you think I have the power to reach the front page of the NYT, but if you had looked at my blog-- or any Jewish philanthropy blog (to my knowledge there are two of us)-- you would see that this is a mythology of your own creation.
It was simply a suggestion to the author. If s/he wasn't interested, fine, but the implication that I suggested something so distasteful (as you describe) is off base.
Maya
The New Jew: Blogging Jewish Philanthropy
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