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 to create 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:
| SUB- COMMITTEE | FIELD OF WORK OF SUB-COMMITTEE |
|---|---|
| I. | Temporary Aid and Transportation. |
| II. | Relief of Aged and Infirm, Unsupported Children, and Friendless Girls. |
| III. | Relief of Unsupported or Partially Supported Families. |
| IV. | Occupations for Women and Confidential Cases. |
| V. | Housing and Shelter. |
| VI. | Business Rehabilitation. |
| VII. | Furniture Grants to heads of families employed but unable to furnish their homes. |
| VIII. | Relief in Deferred and Neglected Cases. |
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:
| SUB- COMMITTEE | CHAIRMAN |
|---|---|
| I. | O. K. Cushing |
| II. | Dr. John Gallwey |
| III. | Archdeacon J. A. Emery[119] |
| IV. | Archdeacon J. A. Emery |
| V. | Rev. D. O. Crowley |
| VI. | C. F. Leege |
[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 the district 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 individual case. 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.