Community Center Loses Contract, Cries Foul By JORDAN MOSS Mosholu Montefiore Community Center has lost a $463,000 case management contract for the Elderly Support Program it has operated since 1977 to the Bronx Jewish Community Council. The switch of providers shocked Center Executive Director Don Bluestone, who said he didn't even know BJCC was submitting a proposal and charged that it was a violation of an unwritten rule that agencies affiliated with United Jewish Appeal (UJA) should submit proposals for contracts held by other UJA agencies. The Elderly Support Program currently employs 11 full-time staffers at MMCC, nine of them caseworkers who assess the needs of elderly clients in Bronx Community Districts 7 and 8 and refer them to the appropriate social services. All 11 workers will lose their jobs. However, Brad Silver, BJCC's executive director, said that Bluestone's employees would be welcome to apply for the jobs offered by his agency. The move follows the controversial changes in the borough's Meals on Wheels program for homebound seniors that took the contract away from several borough social service agencies like MMCC and awarded them to only two large providers -- RAIN and Mid- Bronx Senior Citizens Council. Both of those agencies were apparently able to meet a strict cost cap of $5 per meal because they do not use union labor, nor does BJCC. The Center uses union labor, and Bluestone thinks that and his outspoken stance on Meals on Wheels contributed to his losing the contract. "All of a sudden, since 1977, we're unworthy of doing the program?" Bluestone said, adding that he proposed to operate the program for less money than it cost the previous year. Silver said his agency applied because it could do a better job than MMCC. "We've had concerns about some situations and how some things were handled," Silver said. "And we discussed them with them [MMCC]. They felt their approach was correct and ours was not. In such a situation, the only remedy I have, if we're going to make an improvement in community services, is to use the regular process, the RFP [request for proposals] process. Bluestone responded that Silver never discussed the program with him. "If Bronx Jewish Community Council and Mr. Silver had concerns, then they should have raised them with us in a professional manner, discussing what their issues and concerns were so we could address them," he said. "This has never happened and Mr. Silver's applying for the Elderly Support Program contract behind our backs at a time when our agency was taking the lead in fighting the Department for the Aging over the Meals on Wheels service changes was just plain opportunistic and dishonest and unethical." DFTA spokeswoman Theoni Angelopolous, said that the Meals on Wheels controversy and BJCC's use of non-union workers, had nothing to do with which agency the contract was awarded to. "This is a regular RFP process where every couple of years the city will issue an RFP and the proposal will be selected that best serves seniors and that's the case here," Angelopolous said. BJCC will take over the program on July 1.
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