We call upon NYC Department of the Aging Commissioner Lorraine Cortes-Vazquez to provide the funding necessary for the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Coney Island to continue its long-running Glatt Kosher meals on wheels program. Many clients served by this program, who have been largely the homebound, the elderly and Holocaust survivors, will scrupulously avoid eating non-Glatt Kosher meat out of cultural and religious considerations which are unique to the JCC program. As such, if adequate funding is not forthcoming, they will effectively be denied the hot nutritious meals they certainly need and have come to rely upon the JCC for.
As we understand it, with some programmatic revisions, the funding could easily be provided through stand-alone JCC programs or through enabling subsidies for discrete JCC participation in larger programs. Merging with larger non-kosher and non-Glatt programs would not be an option, as the reliability of the Glatt Kosher claim would inevitably be compromised in the eyes of the clients.
This should be a no-brainer. Indeed, it is hard to contemplate that this particular population should once again be put at risk because of their heritage.
