Woman's work in municipalities

by Mary Ritter Beard

Because of their special fitness to advise with the matrons of almshouses about the domestic arrangements of these institutions.

Because of their fitness to discharge the duty now devolving upon Boards of Overseers of the Poor of towns, as well as of cities, of finding suitable homes outside the almshouse for dependent children. The Legislature at its last session enacted that the Overseers of the Poor of all towns within the commonwealth shall place every child in their charge, and over four years of age, in some respectable family in the state, or in some asylum therein. No such child, who can be thus cared for without inordinate expense is now to be retained in any town or city almshouse in Massachusetts unless idiotic, or otherwise so defective in body or mind as to make his detention in an almshouse desirable or unless he is under the age of eight years and his mother is an inmate thereof and is a suitable person to aid in taking care of him.[^[36]]

In many places, women officials in charge of public charities have shown that directness in action, that promptness, and that efficiency which characterize the new type of public official generally. For instance, Kate Barnard, the secretary of the National Conference of Charities and Corrections, is Commissioner of Charities in Oklahoma. The legal department conducted under her direction has wrested from incompetent or dishonest guardians and returned to orphans some $950,000 in cash, in addition to land probably several times the value of that cash return. The number of orphans involved is 1,373. The department also acts as public defender to prevent miscarriages of justice as far as possible for the poor. This work has been with a very limited appropriation and equipment.

Amelia Sears, the Director of the Cook County, Chicago, Bureau of Child Welfare, has under her direction a corps of assistants trained by her largely, who are to do personal work with the inmates of public institutions and their dependent families. The Juvenile Protective Association will thus be relieved of its volunteer work for prisoners in the county jail, and their dependents. The families of children committed to or released from institutions are to be studied in the hope that their after-care may diminish the “in-andout” cases which are now a drain upon the expenses of the county.

Whenever there is a single piece of relief work on a large scale to be undertaken, women are always to be found on the spot. One of the most conspicuous pieces of immediate relief on a rehabilitation basis was carried out in Dayton, Ohio, after the recent devastation wrought by the river floods. Newspaper accounts told of tragic losses, the dashes of important federal officers to the scene, and the like, but very little has leaked through the press as to the tedious, yet faithful, skillful, and intelligent work of rehabilitation which alone has pulled out of the wreckage the individuals affected and set them on their feet not only once more, but in many cases more firmly, than they had stood before. Of this unobtrusive local work, The Survey said:

“While Edward T. Devine and Eugene T. Lies went to Dayton originally for the Washington Headquarters of the Red Cross, they also are doing their work under the authority and with appropriations from the local committee. They are assisted by Amelia N. Sears, secretary of Woman’s City Club, Chicago, who took part in the San Francisco rehabilitation work; Rose J. McHugh, secretary of Funds to Parents Committee, Chicago; Ada H. Rankin and Johanne Bojesen of the New York Charity Organization Society, who helped in the relief of the victims of the Triangle shirtwaist fire and the Titanic disaster; Grace O. Edwards of the Chicago United Charities; Edna E. Hatfield, probation officer, Indiana Harbor, Ind.; Edith S. Reider, general secretary, Associated Charities, Evanston, Ill.; Helen Zegar of the Compulsory Education Department, Chicago, who was in special charge of the relief of Polish and other immigrant families at the time of the Cherry Mine disaster. These Red Cross agents are in turn aided by a corps of local citizens, especially principals and teachers in the public schools, members of spontaneously organized local committees, and others.”

Charity Transformed

Active and efficient as women have shown themselves in high offices in public and private associations for charitable work, they have not lagged behind in the movement that is transforming the relief of the needy into a war on poverty. Little by little as the work of associated charities has widened, forces within the very organizations themselves necessitated the expansion of the idea of charity into one with broader implications. The organization of relief and the centralization of funds bring about a greater demand for relief because they abolish much of the personal succor of the old type. Instead of more or less lavish care of a few families intimately, all cases of relief that come to the notice of charitably minded persons are, through an organized system of relief, referred to the central agency which is expected when it receives thousands of dollars to do marvelous things with them. The very centralization of charity, however, creates the necessity for offices, clerks and stenographers, investigators, perhaps a training school, salaried heads, publications, and the like which consume funds rapidly. Indeed it has been estimated that in New York City under the system of the Charity Organization Society, it costs several dollars to distribute every single dollar in relief. The system of charity therefore breaks down of its own weight in time, or is transformed, much of the relief money being used for social workers instead of the poor, and the little money that is left being spread over a larger group of recipients.

Of course a centralized bureau of charities can make appeal for money and get responses, but here again it has been estimated that for public movements it often costs a large portion of a dollar to bring in one, even when the greatest care is used in selecting probable donors.

Owing to the financial situation within organized charity, the inquiries into efficiency in relief, and the criticism of almsgiving, charity workers have sought to alleviate distressing conditions by suggesting other means of reform than monetary help. In their own defense they have had to do this, but they have learned by experience that mere monetary relief may sometimes keep a family or an individual under their care in perpetuity. Not being able to secure funds to assist all cases indiscriminately, even had they wished, charity workers began to ask why relief was needed in each case. Thus they learned by home visiting and personal investigation that lack of education, unemployment, sickness, intemperance or poverty, singly or in company, were at the bottom of dependence as it came under their surveillance.