A Vote in the Action

Q.: What do you get when the Government puts $8,000,000 into the ghetto? A.: An $8,000,000 crap game.

Comedian Dick Gregory's sardonic commentary all too accurately sums up the prevailing cynicism concerning poverty programs. Critics from suburbia and the ghetto alike tend to view the war on poverty as a disaster area in which money filters down from the unwilling hands of taxpayers into the inefficient and sometimes greedy fingers of social agencies--stopping just short of the poor whom it is supposed to reach. Such skepticism may often be well founded, but must it be the rule?

The Action for Boston Community Development (ABCD) has taken ambitious steps to ensure that the money does reach the needy. As the local administrative arm of the federal anti-poverty program, the group has heeded an Office of Economic Opportunity mandate calling for "maximum feasible participation" of the poor. Starting in 1965, ABCD established Area Planning Action Councils (APACs) in eleven of the city's low-income neighborhoods.

Despite ghetto apathy, a paucity of funds, and an uncomfortable ethnic mixture in most of Boston's poorest neighborhoods, the results have been remarkable. Now each district boasts its own local board, which gives residents a firm voice in the administration of many community undertakings--among them Head Start nurseries, senior-citizen programs, remedial education and recreation projects. In recent weeks some 14,000 people turned out to cast ballots for 200 candidates seeking 120 seats on the APAC boards. From the Irish and black community of Dorchester to the Italian North End, Boston has witnessed a merry binge of mainstreeting, leafleting and parties with some of the excitement of a mayoral election.

Apolitical. Typical of the elections was the campaigning in the North End, one of the nation's most colorful and tightly knit communities. One victorious candidate, Ted Tomasone, a clerk in the Boston municipal criminal court, had a few posters and a slew of tiny cards printed. Other candidates contented themselves with Magic Marker signs and mimeographed slips reminiscent of student council elections. The atmosphere was distinctly nonpartisan; most of the loudspeaker cars simply urged the people to get out and vote.

The turnout reflected APAC's burgeoning impact. The first election, in 1968, drew a dismal 52 voters. This year 1,628 North Enders went to the polls. Many of them had made no use of new APAC-sponsored facilities (a Head Start nursery, a softball diamond, and even a local theater), but they recognized APAC's importance as a community force. Said Margaret D'Ambrosio, a middle-aged housewife, as she left the polls: "They never had meetings and things like this when we were kids growing up. I don't go to meetings now myself, but they're starting something here that's good for the community." Above all, it seems to give people a sense of doing something worthwhile. Said the North End's executive director, Joseph Bellofatto: "It's a unique form of government. Where else would these people get a direct voice in a quarter of a million dollars?"

Dropout U. With 1,200 full-time salaried staffers and 600 volunteers, the bureaucracy of ABCD alone provides a special form of training program. ABCD Chief Robert Coard explains that a number of students who failed to finish high school have nevertheless moved into the mainstream of U.S. life through their experience as members of the agency's board. "I call it 'Dropout University,' " he says.

There are critics, of course, who are skeptical of such credentials and wonder how thoroughly the poor benefit from the $20 million in programs that ABCD administers. Says City Councilman John Saltonstall Jr., cousin of ex-Senator Leverett Saltonstall: "ABCD is a fine experiment, but I would like to see a more honest and objective effort at assessing what's happening in each of the programs." For all its own version of red tape and entrenched attitudes, however, ABCD is considered by most experts to be one of the more vital and democratic poverty programs in the country.

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