San Diego (special) -- The Jewish National Fund, in a wave of cost-cutting and reorganization, has ordered the closure of its San Diego regional office, terminating the jobs of regional director Jeff Liber, consultant Stacie Bresler, office manager Chare Muth and secretary Brandi Russell.

Russell F. Robinson, JNF's new executive director, said offices in New York, New Jersey, and Florida also were cut, with 32 positions eliminated nationwide, in an effort to increase the percentage of dollars flowing from contributors to Israel.

National JNF has been under severe criticism since audits revealed that an estimated 21 percent of the approximately $30 million raised in the United States in Fiscal Year 1996 had reached Israel, while the rest of the money was either used for salaries, overhead, or educational and informational programs designed to attract more contributors. 

The controversy began after a Houston contributor, Steven Breslauer, who had donated a grove of trees in memory of his son, travelled to Israel and found that his name had been affixed to a mature grove rather than to one just planted. Dissatisfied with the explanations he received from national JNF, Breslauer made his complaints public, resulting in JNF's then president, Milton Shapiro, convening a panel to look into how JNF was spending its money. Among members of the panel were two former chairmen of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, Jack Stein and Rabbi Israel Miller. The panel reported that between 21 and 23 percent of the funds raised by JNF actually had gone to Israel. A large

JEFF LIBER

percentage of the balance had been used for what was described as "Zionist education" -- telling Israel's and JNF's story in the United States in the hope of attracting more contributors.

Sam Cohen, who had been the executive vice president of JNF for two decades, subsequently became senior executive vice president, and later retired. JNF Treasurer Jack Grunspan and Campaign Director Paul Jeser also resigned.

After Ronald Lauder, the former U.S. Ambassador to Austria, was elected in 1997 as JNF president, the organization's lay leadership worked on committees that devised strategies for bringing the percentage of dollars flowing to Israel to 70 percent of the funds raised.

Robinson, a former top fundraising official for United Jewish Appeal, took office as JNF executive vice president on Sept. 2, and immediately implemented the committee's recommendations for $3.86 million in cuts, while adding $1.25 million in cuts of his own. The total of $5.1 million in cuts will reduce JNF's operating overhead by 24.2 percent, he said.

Robinson said JNF has committed itself to reaching the 70 percent mark by the year 2001. He said the 70-30 guideline also was used to judge the efficiency of the regional offices.  For example, it cost about $300,000 to pay the San Diego regional staff and operate the San Diego office at 4225 Executive Square in La Jolla this year, so the operation would have needed to raise $1 million to be within the parameters. Instead, said Robinson, San Diego raised only $600,000 this fiscal year. In comparison, he said, the Orange County office of JNF raised approximately $1.5 million in the same period. Not only will the Orange County JNF office stay open but it will be assigned responsibility for San Diego County as well. Liber said that when he began three years ago as JNF's regional

RUSSELL ROBINSON

director for San Diego County and the Palm Springs area, only $300,000 per year had been raised in the region.

He said during his tenure that amount tripled to $900,000 one year, before falling off as a result of the national furor over how little money actually was reaching Israel. Given sufficient time, he said, he believes more than $1 million annually would have been raised in San Diego. He added that he felt proud of having been able to triple the region's yield in less than three years.

As for the $600,000 for this fiscal year cited by Robinson, Liber said the actual figure may be closer to $750,000 by the time the fiscal year closes Oct. 1. However, he said, "the fact is that we are not raising as much as Los Angeles nor Orange County."

"I fully understand where JNF is coming from," he said. "They need to significantly reduce their expenses around the country, not just here but in other regions and nationally. They made a business decision. They are moving forward and I wish JNF well."

Liber said he expected to wind up his affairs by mid October and to turn JNF's San Diego County files over to Sam Perchik, his counterpart in Orange County. Liber expressed optimism that he and the other members of the regional JNF staff would locate new jobs quickly. 

Bresler said she will work at the Israel Center at United Jewish Federation, and Brandi Russell reportedly has already taken a job in private industry.

Perchik told HERITAGE he planned to spend time at the San Diego regional office this week to learn its operations and to begin figuring how to allocate responsibilities. Perchik, a native of Tel Aviv and graduate of Hebrew University in Jerusalem, has run the Orange County JNF office for seven years.

In an interview with HERITAGE, Robinson said the previous JNF administration had adopted a strategy of building a constituency for the future, by investing in programs for high school and college students, and young adults to visit and become involved in Israel. But the programs did not generate the kind of contributions hoped for.

"It was good people making bad decisions upon certain strategies that didn't pan out," Robinson said. "But it wasn't a matter of individuals who were making a conscious effort not to send money to Israel. It was just that they were looking at how to make this organization grow by leaps and bounds and their strategy just wasn't one that worked out. 

"Now we will go with a different strategy that I believe is a sound strategy."

That strategy includes turning more responsibilities over to volunteers and to lay leadership in an effort not only to save on staff expenses but also to raise the excitement level of the volunteers, who now will be more engaged in decision making.

"If you look at volunteer organizations, the ones that are profitable and productive in a non-profit world are the ones which have engagement and empowerment of the lay leadership," Robinson said.

Exactly how responsibilities will be divided between the lay leadership who reside in San Diego County and the staff which is based in Orange County remains to be worked out, said Robinson.

He said he planned to visit San Diego in the near future to meet with Dr. Sol Lizerbram, who is president of JNF's San Diego region, and other lay leaders to discuss just such questions.

Lizerbram, chairman of FPA Medical Management, Inc., said he planned to go to JNF's New York headquarters in advance of Robinson's visit here to discuss the matter with him

"This is a business decision that is not based on San Diego or any one specific community," Lizerbram said about the reorganization. "It is how can we best service JNF and Israel in a most efficient manner." 

"I believe they are making an appropriate business decision," Lizerbram added. "Of course we would love to have a local office here in San Diego, and sometime in the future that might happen again, but in order to facilitate the most amount of donated dollars to go to Israel this consolidation should take place."

Another San Diego board member, Leonard Gregory, expressed "mixed feelings" over the decision to shut down the office. On one hand, he said, he was "saddened by the cuts" and doubted whether the Orange County office would be able to generate as much enthusiasm for projects as Liber and his San Diego staff had done. "They really are extraordinary," he said.

On the other hand, Gregory said, as a businessman himself -- he is the chief executive officer of California Turf -- "I am always looking for ways to cut expenses, so from the sheer business standpoint it might have been the right thing to do."

He said Lauder has been "restoring credibility" to JNF as its national president, and "obviously it is important to demonstrate to potential large givers that JNF is a well-run, lean, mean machine."