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Monday, Mar 29, 2004

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Posted on Sat, Mar. 27, 2004

$1 million to help ex-inmates

As part of the White House's faith-based initiative, the U.S.
Labor Department has awarded $1.05 million to a Philadelphia project
that helps people leaving prison find jobs and housing and meet
other "reentry" needs.

The three-year grant will help seven local groups pay for case
managers and boost job training and placement work and
volunteer-recruitment efforts, said Roger Conner, director of Search
for Common Ground USA, the agency administering the grant.

Five of the groups are faith-based: REST Philly, New Hope for
Women, Community Connections Inc., Crossroads Prison Ministries, and
the Philadelphia Alive Center for Transformation. The secular groups
are the Pennsylvania Prison Society and IMPACT Services Corp.

The seven groups are part of a local coalition of government and
private agencies working to coordinate prison reentry programs,
Conner said.

According to Search for Common Ground, more than 600,000 people
will be released from prisons nationwide this year, including 35,000
in Philadelphia. The local grant is one of 17 issued to community
coalitions under a $22.5 million federal ex-offender initiative.

Black Clergy initiative

Black Clergy of Philadelphia and Vicinity is initiating a
centralized project to help people buy homes. The Community
Homeownership Program will run workshops and offer credit analysis
and other financial advice, said Sandi Williams, who is setting up
the project.

While some large churches already have such programs, the Black
Clergy project will use one model citywide, available to the group's
600 member churches.

PNC, Congress and Citizens Banks are providing funding and
expertise to the project, which plans to assist 2,500 people in the
next year, Williams said. The project will be announced Monday, with
an opening workshop set for April 17. Information: 215-663-9028.

Jewish center on aging

The Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in Wyncote has launched
a program on aging that it says is the first at a major U.S.
rabbinical school.

Hiddur: The Center for Aging and Judaism will train rabbinical
students "to bring hiddur, or glory, to the elders," and will
develop various resources, said Rabbi Dayle Friedman, the center's
founding director.

About one-fourth of America's Jews are 60 or older, with the
numbers "rapidly growing," said Friedman, a leading figure in Jewish
pastoral care.

The center was inaugurated with a program Thursday in which
$280,000 was given to endow the center's core courses on aging.
Hiddur will cosponsor a daylong symposium on aging May 3 at
Congregation Rodeph Shalom in Philadelphia. Information:
215-576-0800.

Peace rally today

Bishop Thomas Gumbleton of Detroit and the Rev. Roy Bourgeois,
founder of School of Americas Watch, headline a rally here today by
peace activists who want the military-training school closed and the
U.S.-led war on terrorism to end.

A coalition of religious, labor and grassroots groups will
assemble at the Art Museum steps for the 1 p.m. rally. The event is
part of a campaign against the school at Fort Benning, Ga., which
critics say has trained Latin American strongmen and political
assassins.

Information: 215-477-5892 or http://www.soawne.org/.

Basketball benefit

The Palestra will be the scene of a benefit basketball tournament
tomorrow that seeks to raise $40,000 in aid to Israeli families that
have lost loved ones to suicide bombers and other attacks.

The four Jewish agencies, called JCC WithOut Walls, are running
the Points for the Promised Land tourney, in which three-person
teams compete in 12-minute games. Three dozen teams have signed up,
and walk-ins will be taken at 8:30 a.m. (at $125 per team). An
opening ceremony will be held at 9 a.m. in the Palestra, 33d Street
south of Walnut. Information: 610-578-9000.

- Jim Remsen

and Phaedra Trethan

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