IIMETHODS OF WORK[104]

[102]SeePart II,p. 145ff.

By way of introduction to the following chapter, a summary may well be made of the periods of time into which the rehabilitation work naturally fell.

May 5 marked the beginning of the rehabilitation work under the direction of the Red Cross, a period when a force of workers, trained and untrained, got steadily to work, and when policies began to be shaped. It may be called the formative period.

July 7 began the second period. It was the time when the Rehabilitation Committee of the Finance Committee of Relief and Red Cross Funds got into the saddle, carrying with it the staff and adopting the policies of the formative period. It was marked by the rapid development of district organizations; by the rapid increase in the number of applications for relief. It may be called the period of accelerated applications.

August 20 opened the third period, when a decline in the number of applications was brought about by new restrictions upon the character of cases eligible for consideration; the time when the advisability of the district plan of organization was brought in question. Furthermore, it was the time when grants were sharply limited by the withholding of the eastern funds.[103]This may be called the period of arrested progress.

[103]SeePart I,p. 99ff.

November 4 began the fourth period, when the centralized plan was in force and when a persistent effort was made graduallyto decrease the responsibilities carried by the Rehabilitation Committee. It was the period of centralized effort.

April 9, 1907, marked the beginning of the fifth and last period, which closed June 30, 1907, with the taking over of the rehabilitation work by the Associated Charities. It was a time of rapid discharge of committees and of readjustments,—the period of withdrawal.

Beforethe formation of the Rehabilitation Committee the Associated Charities[105]had assumed responsibility, under the Red Cross, for the investigation of applicants for rehabilitation. During July the Associated Charities under the direction of the Rehabilitation Committee organized in each of the seven civil sections of the city a committee of persons who were related more or less to the previous charity work of the locality. Each section or district office was supervised by a chairman[106]under whom was an agent with a corps of visitors and clerks. By securing in addition to the local charity workers the services of several experienced workers from states east of the Sierras, it was possible, as has been already stated, to have an experienced agent in each district. Four sections were in charge of agents drawn from the outside; three of agents with experience in the San Francisco Associated Charities.

[104]The section on methods inAppendix I,p. 406ff., supplements this chapter. It is more detailed than is this portion, and is important to those who are responsible for organizing a relief force.[105]SeePart I,p. 14.[106]These chairmen were the same men who had been serving since May as the civilian chairmen in their several sections.

[104]The section on methods inAppendix I,p. 406ff., supplements this chapter. It is more detailed than is this portion, and is important to those who are responsible for organizing a relief force.

[105]SeePart I,p. 14.

[106]These chairmen were the same men who had been serving since May as the civilian chairmen in their several sections.

The month of July was one that called for the exercise of discretion and tact, as it was a time when a large untried force had to be organized to visit families. A general superintendent of district work was appointed to bring about unity of ideals and standards in the sections and to cultivate a sympathetic understanding of the system on the part of all concerned in it. The position was held during July by one of the eastern workers and after August 1 by the general secretary of the Associated Charities. The section committees, mentioned above, made a strong and interested group of volunteers.

In one of the sections was to be found a group of workers who knew their neighborhood thoroughly,—a physician who had done active work among the poorer people previous to April 18, the president of a settlement, and the priest. These met together each day with others to go over the case work of the investigators who were studying the individual needs of refugees. Nowhere else could one get such an impression of the cosmopolitan character of San Francisco. The names of the investigators showed their origin,—Italian, Spanish, English, Scotch. These could speak to the refugees in their own tongues. One of the investigators was a trained nurse who had been at work in the neighborhood; another, an artist who had been the year before as far away from the Pacific Coast as the Albert Nyanza; the third, a student of economics. In still another section were to be found as investigators a force of college students. Seven of them were from Stanford University. They gave devoted service from April until the university opened in the autumn. They camped in the outer office and would work from early in the morning until late in the evening. They were often visiting at six in the morning and were to be found in the office writing reports at ten in the evening. Several teachers, a physician, and a trained nurse made up the rest of the group, which was guided at first by one of the most active and devoted local workers, a probation officer of the juvenile court.

In another section one felt the distinctive mark to be catholicity. The chairman of this committee was a Presbyterian minister and the assistant to the agent was a Unitarian minister who had given up his charge to devote himself for a year to the charitable work of the city. A Hebrew whose strong personal influence counted for much in dealing with the refugees of his faith; another Hebrew, a woman, who as a volunteer had done most important service in securing work for the refugees; an active worker in women’s clubs; and other men and women who had had experience as teachers and in business, completed this section committee.

In so large a group of investigators, brought into service at a time of high pressure, there were necessarily to be found many attitudes of mind toward the work and varying degrees of readiness to be instructed. What surprised those who had the task offitting the visitors to their work was their adaptability. The committees met at short intervals to review, one by one, the stories and recommendations of the investigators, and to make their own decisions to be submitted for final action to the Rehabilitation Committee at headquarters.

The investigating force of the Rehabilitation Committee reached its highest number in August, 1906, when it numbered 96 persons on full and nine on half time. Sixty-five other persons were also employed, principally as clerks and messengers. The Committee from the start took the sensible ground that as far as possible there should be investigation of each applicant. The record card used in the sections was the second registration card, which as the reader knows, superseded the one adopted in the initial relief period.[107]

[107]SeePart I,p. 49. See cards inAppendix II,pp. 428and429.

The second registration was undertaken by the staff of workers gathered together by the American National Red Cross, who worked from the seven civil sections and recorded their investigations on the improved cards described below. These cards, which were kept on file at headquarters, were, from the time of the second registration to the end of the rehabilitation work, used by the various committees. They held the facts as to an individual’s own expectation of providing shelter for himself and family. Later these cards served to measure the degree of success each applicant had made in carrying out his own plan.

The second registration, though not to the same degree as the first, failed in completeness, so that many persons who applied later, not only to the Rehabilitation Committee but to the many other committees and departments, were given relief by those who were in ignorance of what help had already been extended. If registration had been accurate and complete from the beginning much saving of money and time would have been effected, and, of immeasurably greater importance, much better rehabilitation work could have been done. A thorough system of registration would have been opposed by many of the relief workers, as well as by the refugees, but the importance of securing, in beginning such a work, an accurate registration of names and references and of entering on the dated cards the facts of aid requestedand given, cannot be over-estimated. The outstanding need of the later rehabilitation work was for a registration so inclusive that it might serve as a general confidential exchange of information[108]of the sums of relief given and the efforts made to rehabilitate individuals or families. One of those who had partial supervision of enumeration for the first registration has said that a more carefully prepared card and a rigid supervision of investigators could have secured the desired results even if the investigators were untrained. The lack of a well ordered bureau for confidential exchange of information led to serious duplication of inquiry and of grants.

[108]Registration as a means of holding and securing information was in use by various committees other than the Rehabilitation Committee.

But to return to a consideration of the record card. It provided for a graphic presentation of the salient economic features of each family. When rightly filled in it showed the total present income of the family, its physical condition and the previous occupation of the breadwinner, the sum of its losses and its present resources. It gave a picture of the family’s former or present relations to its church, its lodge, its employers, its plan for rehabilitation, and the investigator’s estimate of this plan or the investigator’s alternative plan. Each visitor who had not had previous training as an investigator was given careful direction as to how an investigation should be made. Each was instructed to explain to the families that what was being aimed at was to find a way out which would be a real way out. Relief that had been already given was emergent, temporary. But now the Committee was anxious to learn of those who with a fair grant would be able to re-establish themselves.

In compiling the statistical abstract of applications forChapter IVof this part of the Relief Survey no attempt was made to ascertain what references were seen or corresponded with, except for the business application cases. These were controlled by much stricter regulations than were the other applications. It is impossible, therefore, to state accurately the number of applications that were superficially investigated by visits to the applicants only. It is probably true that a study of the applications for household rehabilitation would show that comparatively superficialinvestigations had been made although there had usually been some attempt to corroborate the applicants’ stories by calling for a general letter of recommendation or one written directly to the Committee. Letters from ministers bulked large in this correspondence. The experience of the Rehabilitation Committee, it can be most positively stated, confirmed that of the special relief committee of the Chicago fire that such recommendations are valueless in the vast majority of cases. It is sufficient to state here, as this question will be brought up later in the discussion of the Committee’s relation to the auxiliary societies,[109]that the Committee learned quite early in its career that some of the clergy of the city had had manifolded a stereotyped form of recommendation to give to any one who might apply.

[109]SeePart II,p. 137ff.

The method of investigation in force would have been insufficient if it had been thought necessary to inquire closely into the moral character of the applicants. What the family had to say about its previous income; what its present income was; what its plans were and how it hoped with the aid of a grant to carry out these plans,—these with the visitor’s observations gave a sort of rough-and-ready gauge. There was, of course, a certain amount of deception, but the field investigations made later by the Relief Survey showed that the percentage of grants made upon actually fraudulent representations was comparatively small. Plans for rehabilitation that were inherently weak or confused or unwise had to be guarded against. The grant desideratum was practical definiteness. Illustrations of what were considered to be definite, what indefinite plans, are incidentally presented under the chapters dealing with particular forms of rehabilitation. It is well at this point to state that after October 12, 1906, before a grant for rehabilitation or aid for furniture could be obtained, an application had to be made to the Rehabilitation Committee on a printed form.[110]

[110]For reproduction of form seeAppendix II,p. 435.

The applications for tools were made the subject of a comparatively superficial investigation. Transportation cases were subjected to a gradual rise in the standard of inquiry. In the case of “general relief,” which included the permanent care of aged or invalid persons and of unsupported children, medical co-operationwas generally called for. Applications for emergent relief led to no extended investigation. The housing applications, as will appear,[111]were subjected to special forms of inquiry.

[111]SeePart I,pp. 22-23and69ff.;Part IV, Housing Rehabilitation,p. 211ff.; andAppendix I,p. 417.

Applications were received at the seven section offices at any hour of the day, as well as at the central office of the Associated Charities. The rule was, theoretically, to receive no applications at the office of the Rehabilitation Committee; but so many applications, some of which called for immediate investigation and action, were referred directly to the Committee, that from one to four interviewers had to be held at the central office to attend to them. It would have been ill-advised during July and August to limit either the hours or places at which applications could be made. Any limitation might in some instances have caused actual distress. The magnitude of the task did not in itself, save in exceptional circumstances, delay the giving of emergent relief, as special arrangements were made for expediting emergency cases.

Before recommendations were brought to the members of the Rehabilitation Committee for decision they were read by trusted employes of the Committee in order that apparent injustices resulting from the varying standards of the different section committees might be done away with. The Committee itself established rough standards to govern its decisions. For household rehabilitation, for instance, its standard adopted after a careful employe had visited several furniture companies to learn the range of prices, was based upon a rate of $50 a room for each of the minimum number of rooms which would be required for an individual family. Certain fixed rules were also adopted with reference to business rehabilitation.[112]There was no little criticism of an intermediate step having to be taken between the passage of records from section committees to the Rehabilitation Committee. During the latter part of the second period, which ended in August, 1906, some members of the Rehabilitation Committee itself were inclined to doubt the wisdom of the plan. Nevertheless, the opinion of the majority of the Committee was that its rough standardizing was a great time saver. The reviewersexercised no discretionary authority. They were indeed willing to present any case, in any form, to the Committee if a section committee insisted upon it. A justification of the plan lies in the fact that when a case went directly to the Committee from a section, almost without exception it was sent back. The reviewers served simply as advisers to the section committees. They had in mind the broad lines of policy that had been marked out by the Rehabilitation Committee and were in many instances able to save from one to two days in the reaching of a final decision as to a grant. An explanation made by the trained reviewer to a district messenger, an agent, or Committee member, was oftentimes much more acceptable than would have been Committee action which reversed a section decision.

[112]For full discussion seePart III, Business Rehabilitation,p. 171ff.

Headquarters Department of Relief and Rehabilitation, Gough and Geary Streets

Another subject that called for anxious debate was as to the degree of power that should be given by the Rehabilitation Committee to the section committees to make grants of money for emergency need. On July 12, the Committee resolved that in an emergency case a requisition might be made on the treasurer for a sum not to exceed $50, provided the request were signed by two members of the section committee. The Committee reserved the right to review such grants and at any time to withdraw the privilege from the sections. At a meeting held a day or so afterward this matter was reconsidered and laid over because several members of the Committee expressed themselves forcibly as opposed to any division of responsibility. At a joint meeting of the Rehabilitation Committee with the members of the section committees, held on July 19, 1906, the question of placing small funds in the hands of the section committees was again informally considered. Some of the section members strongly urged this plan and cited illustrations of necessary delays incident upon the ordinary procedure,—illustrations which proved that the delay was a source of embarrassment. As a member of the Committee recently said, a great amount of unpleasantness was caused by complaints of delay in comparatively small matters. Objections still being made by some members, the Committee asked the Associated Charities to present a plan, but though such a plan was drawn up it was never presented for action to the Committee because of the objections that were raised against it.

This source of friction was removed in the course of events. When the Bureau of Special Relief[113]was established on August 15, 1906, applications for emergency relief in kind were referred to it. On the closing of the section headquarters, Committee I of the centralized system[114]was prepared to give small money grants on short notice. The Associated Charities, from almost the beginning of the rehabilitation work, also stood ready to make small gifts of money to persons in need, or to make immediate purchase of necessities. It was from time to time reimbursed for these expenditures, though no formal arrangement was made by which it could draw on any regular fund for petty cash expenditures.

[113]SeePart II,p. 145ff.[114]SeePart II,p. 125.

[113]SeePart II,p. 145ff.

[114]SeePart II,p. 125.

Anyone who has had experience in a charity organization society which has district offices knows that the common rule is to empower a district superintendent or committee to make emergency expenditures of comparatively limited amounts and to draw for reimbursement on the society’s general relief fund. Such special expenditures are subject to audit. The principle underlying them is at stated periods to have their issuance made the subject of a careful review by the general secretary, the district supervisor or some other central office official. In case of continuous indiscreet expenditures the question raised is not whether the power shall be withdrawn but whether there shall be some change in the district force or some calling of volunteers to account. In other words, the principle has been recognized that though there can be no division of final responsibility as to expenditures, as a matter of practical efficiency, districts must be given a certain amount of discretion in the making of small emergency grants.

The extent of the task of investigating and reviewing cases can be measured by the following showing. When the Rehabilitation Committee settled to its task on July 7, 1906, the formative period of rehabilitation work closed. The second period was inaugurated by public announcement of the Rehabilitation Committee’s plans. During July, 1906, the work increased by leaps and bounds. Though the Committee might wish to feel its way there was no time for deliberate action as the members had simply to speed up in order to keep ahead of the applications awaiting action. By August 1 the Committee had passed upon 3,000applications. On that same date there were about 9,000 applications in the sections which either were awaiting investigation or had been partially or fully investigated, but awaited action by the section committees. The original estimate of families that would need rehabilitation was 15,000. To pass on one-fifth of the whole may be considered to be fairly good progress for the first three weeks of a committee’s real work. During the next twelve days, as the news of the grants began to circulate widely, came the high-water mark of applications. On August 13, at the request of the chairman of the Committee, a complete return was made which showed that there were then 8,916 applications pending, and that the average rate of applications was somewhat over 200 a day. The danger of swamping the work was evident.

At the time when the number of applications for rehabilitation was heaviest came the uncertainty as to whether funds would be available. The chairman of the Rehabilitation Committee, therefore, at an important meeting held on August 12, requested members to present a definite plan as to the amount of money that they would request the Executive Committee to set aside for rehabilitation. Accordingly, on August 16, the following estimate was presented as the minimum amount that would be required for carrying on the work of the Department:

TABLE 29.—ESTIMATE OF AMOUNT REQUIRED FOR CARRYING ON WORK OF RELIEF, PRESENTED AUGUST 16, 1906[115]

[115]On August 11, 1906, the balance sheet of the San Francisco Relief and Red Cross Funds showed that a total of $5,599,466.02 had been received by that body; that deducting expenditures and immediate liabilities there was an actual cash balance of $2,105,309.74. This total was not all available for the uses of the Rehabilitation Committee but was the only source of support for the Department of Camps and Warehouses, the Department of Lands and Buildings, both of which required large sums, and all other activities of the Relief Corporation.

What the estimate for rehabilitation was based upon it is difficult to say, though the original estimate of $1,500,000 may have again been in mind. By August 16, applications to the number of 4,635 had been passed upon by the Committee, involving a total disbursement of a little over $300,000 and an average grant of about $80 a case. About 10,000 applications were pending and there were still three or four thousand families in the camps who would eventually have to be assisted by the Committee. Upon this basis a total of $1,120,000 would be required, and this may have been the basis for the estimate. Prospective applications from persons living outside the camps were not taken into account.

No action was taken when the estimate was presented, but at the meeting of the Committee on August 20 the chairman again presented a detailed report regarding funds available for the Corporation. After a very extended discussion it was agreed that it would not be safe for the Rehabilitation Committee to take further action until it knew something more definite regarding the amount of money it would receive and the amount that would be called for by the applications on file. The Committee decided therefore to notify the sections, the societies that were authorized to investigate applications for relief, and the press, that after August 20 no more applications for rehabilitation and relief would be received until all the cases pending had been investigated and disposed of. After this date no official notice was ever given of the readiness of the Committee to again receive applications.

Applications for medical aid, and in special instances for food, were to be received, however, as before, at the section stations. This action, which was momentous, inaugurated the third period of work,[116]which extended from August 20 to November 4, 1906. A large number of applications was received later and all the applications on file were in the course of time duly considered and made whenever necessary the subject of grants, the amount of money used for rehabilitation being in the end considerably larger than was estimated. August 20 is the sinister date which appears and reappears in the later chapters, when the subject of delay in the rehabilitation work is discussed.

[116]SeePart II,p. 111.

The superintendent of the Rehabilitation Committee at that time prepared detailed instructions for the force at the main and at the section offices. These instructions were adopted later by the sub-committees of the centralized system. The instructions provided that future applications and those pending but not yet investigated, for medicine, medical aid, special diet, food, tools, and sewing machines, be referred to the Bureau of Special Relief, and that they be considered with reference to the relative disability of the applicants, in the following order:

1. Aged and infirm.2. Sick and temporarily disabled.3. Unsupported women and children (families without male breadwinners and with the burden of support resting heavily on the women or children).4. Families insufficiently supported (breadwinners unable to earn enough to provide a surplus for rehabilitation or enough even to pay running expenses).

1. Aged and infirm.

2. Sick and temporarily disabled.

3. Unsupported women and children (families without male breadwinners and with the burden of support resting heavily on the women or children).

4. Families insufficiently supported (breadwinners unable to earn enough to provide a surplus for rehabilitation or enough even to pay running expenses).

After the four classes of cases had been investigated and reported to the Rehabilitation Committee for final action, the sections were to investigate the remaining applications. This latter group of applications[117]was to be divided into three classes:

1. Household rehabilitation.2. Special building propositions not covered by the Department of Lands and Buildings.3. Miscellaneous cases.

1. Household rehabilitation.

2. Special building propositions not covered by the Department of Lands and Buildings.

3. Miscellaneous cases.

[117]All applications made by refugees living outside of San Francisco were considered by the whole committee.

The immediate attention of the Rehabilitation Committee, now that the general drawing of checks was suspended, was confined to those applications already on file in which emergent action was absolutely necessary or in which grants had been promised provided certain conditions were complied with by the applicants. All applications for business rehabilitation were to be laid aside for a time with the understanding that if the Committee later secured sufficient means they should be investigated and reported on. The Committee indicated that unless disablement or sickness were involved it would be most reluctantto consider any family to be in urgent need if in it there were a male breadwinner earning reasonable wages.

The plan of the Rehabilitation Committee was to go over the whole mass of applications and then draw checks in favor of the first four classes. This marked a distinct limitation upon its work. By vote of the Committee on August 30, 1906, it was decided to settle at once all unpaid grants that had been approved on August 20. By September 20 accumulated applications had been investigated and the Committee was ready to pass upon them. It is not clear from the records just when the bars were lifted and when checks were issued as heretofore upon all classes of cases approved by the Committee. There appears to have been no formal action in this matter. It is interesting to note that on August 18 the total disbursements recorded were $356,773.75 and the total applications acted upon 5,241. By September 20, 1906, the total disbursements amounted to $573,337.91 and the total cases acted upon were 10,374.

In October, 1906, there was a radical change of method. On September 27, the Rehabilitation Committee was notified by the Corporation that all the sections except Section II would close by the end of September. As the section offices closed, members of the paid and voluntary staffs were drawn into the work of the central office, the paid workers to continue as investigators or clerks, the members of the district committees to serve as an auxiliary committee to the Rehabilitation Committee for the review of cases. These were steps preliminary to a centralizing of the work. On October 11, when the chairman presented his plan for a division of the Rehabilitation Committee into sub-committees, 18,196 applications altogether had been passed upon. At close of business, October 11, 1906, the bookkeeper of the Committee had handled these 18,196 cases and had paid out on them $842,076.21.

The plan for the centralized system was presented by a sub-committee consisting of the chairman and the superintendent, who was the secretary of the Associated Charities and responsible for the issuing of instructions to the district workers. It was tocreate six sub-committees. The Rehabilitation Committee was to be drawn on to provide a chairman for each and the former section committees to provide the membership. The numbers of the sub-committees and their respective fields of work were as follows:

Committee VII was formed on January 16, 1907; Committee VIII on November 17, 1906. Each was considered as a sub-committee of the older sub-committees. Two of the six secretaries already appointed served the new committees. It may be noted here that five of these six secretaries had had previous experience in charity organization work.

The following members[118]of the Rehabilitation Committee were appointed chairmen of the respective sub-committees:

[118]Two of these served as chairmen of Committees VII and VIII.

[119]Succeeded by A. Haas.

The methods of investigation under the new system were the same as under the old, but the change involved radical differences in treatment. It is generally acknowledged that thedistrict system was the only one practicable in the early days, when transportation facilities were so limited. The physical difficulties that would have been involved in attempting to make an investigation from one center was not the only, if indeed the most important factor that led social leaders to determine upon the district plan. The primary reason was that the seven civil sections were known to the people when they wished to follow their early applications for clothing and other emergent needs by applications for rehabilitation. The social investigation was made to fit the civil section plan, which was based upon the theory that by working from district centers it was possible to gain more accurate knowledge of the actual needs of families and to have such brought more quickly to the attention of the workers and be followed more surely by helpful recommendations than would be the case if need were relieved and recommendations made by one or several central committees. In short, it was believed that the district plan of the larger charity organization societies could be well adapted to the rehabilitation work and would give it greater firmness, accuracy, and swiftness of action. As it turned out, however, under the district plan the hoped-for swiftness of action was not achieved, which was one of the reasons for the change to the centralized system. After the change the average period of time lapsing between application and grant was considerably reduced; however, this is partly to be accounted for by the fact that after October, 1906, the Rehabilitation Committee acted more rigorously on the policy adopted August 20 to limit the number of applications received.

During the first five months of the great relief work the most destitute had made application. This fact, and the further fact that prompt action was made possible through the creation of the Bureau of Special Relief, justified in a measure the change to the centralized system. The advantages of the centralized system as developed in San Francisco may be said to be that under it the attention of a group of workers was confined to the consideration of a specific class of grants. Such limitations brought expertness and a surer standardizing of the grants within a class. The disadvantage is that with the gain in expertness came a loss in general appreciation of the need of the individualcase. The individual members of the Rehabilitation Committee worked separately as chairmen of the sub-committees. They were brought much less to consider in common the reason for approving or refusing to approve the grants called for by the several section committees. In the earlier period some of the members in daily conference performed this important duty. Members of the Committee themselves believed that they lost something of the broad view of the situation and the correlation between grants when each came to have his own particular field of activity. Although they developed as specialists, they were bound by no strong unifying force.

Some of the members, and other persons experienced in the work, consider the division of cases to have been a weakness that should be reckoned with by those who may deal with similar problems in the future. Important questions of policy were of course discussed at meetings of the Rehabilitation Committee, which in the busy season were called twice a week; but after all, it was general questions of policy, not individual cases, which were then considered. The important thing was for the Committee to have on any given day a knowledge of just how the grants in each department ran; to learn by a comparative survey whether, in view of the total sum of money which the Committee expected to handle, the amounts being granted by the different departments, case by case, ordinary case after ordinary case, were too small or too large.

Another weakness of the centralized system, and a serious one, was that it necessitated the crossing of each other’s paths by the various sub-committees. It was to be expected that by no imaginable classification of applications short of an arbitrary division along geographical lines, could confusion be avoided. As all charity organization workers know, an application for a specific form of aid may upon investigation indicate that a totally different form of relief is required. In the first two months, under the centralized system, there was much referring of applications from committee to committee, as new or changed needs were revealed; but in December, to prevent delays, it was decided that the committee to whom an application was first assignedshould see it through to the end, no matter what form of rehabilitation was found to be required.

Considering the blurring of hard and fast lines that this decision entailed, together with the crossing of paths incident to the division of work, it is not surprising that the development of group specialists was by no means as complete as was anticipated. The sub-committees found it impossible to keep to the spheres of work outlined. There was, however, considerable variation in treatment by the different sub-committees. In the nature of the case, the first four committees had largely to do with applications for “general relief” and hence of necessity crossed paths more than the remaining committees. Among the different fields of activity, housing stands distinctive as being the most highly specialized. On the other hand, business rehabilitation and general relief were so generally cared for by the first four committees that all of them might well claim joint tenancy of these fields.

During October the policy had been adopted of making no further grants to able-bodied single people,[120]to heads of families capable of supporting those dependent on them, or to applicants to start in a business that called for a special license or that had to be put under special police supervision. This last exception was made to prohibit grants for saloons. On October 12, the Rehabilitation Committee learned officially that business rehabilitation might be resumed, as the New York Chamber of Commerce on October 2 had resolved to transfer $500,000 to the Corporation, with the proviso that the money be used for “the rehabilitation of those sufferers who by reason of the disaster have been deprived of the use of stocks or goods, utensils, tools, implements of labor, etc., and thus to help them to establish themselves in their professions or trades.”

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