This subseries is comprised of the minutes of meetings of the Board of Directors and the various committees of the Brooklyn Council for Social Planning from its founding in 1933 until its demise in 1957. Administrative committees include Nominating, Executive, Finance, and Membership. The various programs of the BCSP are represented in their committee minutes (See also Series 3, Program files), as well as the following committees not represented in the program files: Committee on Unattached Men (homeless men), Population Changes, Neighborhood Development, Employment Problems of Older Women, and Food Stamps. During World War II, committee activities addressed war-related issues: Committee on War Activities; Japanese-American Committee, which assisted in the adjustment of "loyal" Japanese-Americans, and assisted Japanese coming to Brooklyn according to the plans of the War Relocation Authority.

The minutes of the following committees were removed before this collection came to the Brooklyn Public Library: Puerto Rican Steering Committee meeting minutes, September 1952 - December 1957, were given to the Brooklyn Bureau of Social Service and Children's Aid Society, December 31, 1957.

Mental Hygiene Committee, June 1933 - May 1956, were given to the Brooklyn Association for Mental Health, December 31, 1957. Minutes of the committee from September 1956 - December 1957 are included in this series.

Health Careers Committee, January - April 1956, were given to the Brooklyn Tuberculosis and Health Association, December 31, 1957.

The purpose of the Brooklyn Health Council was to bring together health agencies functioning in the community to coordinate and facilitate work, evaluate needs, initiate projects, and act as an information bureau. BCSP was a member of the Brooklyn Health Council, along with the City departments of Education, Health, Hospitals, Brooklyn Tuberculosis and Health Association, Visiting Nurse Association, and other agencies. These minutes were found with the BCSP minutes in separate binder.

Correspondence, minutes, and reports of annual meetings, lectures, forums and conferences sponsored by BCSP, and correspondence of committees charged with program activities (Program Committee, Needs and Resources Committee, and Plan and Scope Committee), are found in these files.

Adoption, foster care, day care, and child welfare issues are well-documented in these files of committee and general correspondence, press clippings, and related material. Among the more interesting material is documentation of Brooklyn Day Care Week, and of the Little White House Conference on Children and Youth, an important event organized by BCSP in 1951 to address the social welfare needs of children in Brooklyn; this was a local follow-up to a national conference at the White House in Washington.

These files clarify how instrumental BCSP was in the development, improvement and maintenance of recreational facilities in Brooklyn, and describe in detail the need for new and improved community recreational facilities and centers, public school gyms, and public programs such as summer camps and swimming pools. Included here is the correspondence of the Fort Greene-Farragut Coordinating committee, which organized recreation programs in the new Fort Greene-Farragut housing project, and correspondence of the sub-committee on the establishment of St. John's Park, at Schenectady Avenue and Bergen Street. (Also see Series 5, Brooklyn neighborhood welfare and health councils, for related material.)

This subseries provides a thorough overall review of BCSP's health care committees, including Mental Health, Family Service, Nutrition, and Medical Social Work. Correspondence with the Health Council Division, a large umbrella organization which reviewed and assessed social health and welfare committees, is some of the more significant material located here, as is committee correspondence on the need for fluoridation of drinking water and the need for a community hospital in Bedford-Stuyvesant.

These files address Brooklyn's acute public housing situation and BCSP's role in enforcing and promoting housing legislation, including support of large housing projects. The files contain primarily committee correspondence and some press clippings.

Substantial documentation on social problems and community needs is provided here. Of particular interest is the correspondence of the South-Brooklyn Coordinating Committee, which organized a neighborhood council to assess local needs, and the Williamsburg-Tompkins Park Group Leadership Project, which was active in starting a youth center in response to neighborhood gang activity. (See also Series 5 for related organizations and activities).

Included here are files on seminars, workshops, and a Spanish language class sponsored by BCSP to aid social workers in their professional duties, as well as on the production of "Welcome to Brooklyn: Handbook for New Workers." This publication, and its subsequent editions, is found in Series 8, publications.

This subseries includes files on various BCSP programs including: "Our Expanding Negro Population," a 1940 BCSP conference; a 1954 survey and statement on proposed cuts to mass transportation; World War II era veterans' services; volunteerism; and youth activities. Files include committee correspondence, reports, and pamphlets.

BCSP was a member of the city-wide Welfare and Health Council of New York; it acted as the Brooklyn borough representative agency. Formed by the merger of the Welfare Council of New York City and the Health Council of New York City in 1952, the organization disbanded itself in February 1956 and formed the Greater New York Community Council, Inc. This was done in an effort to appeal to the Catholic agencies which withdrew from the Welfare and Health Council in 1953 in protest over the admission to the Council of an arm of Planned Parenthood; the Welfare and Health Council experienced financial difficulties after this withdrawal. The Councils' primary functions were the overall planning and coordination of health and welfare services, and providing central services required by the community and the agencies city-wide to produce these services. This subseries includes committee correspondence, reports, minutes of meetings, press clippings, and related material addressing topics such as housing, services to adolescent children, mental health, services to the aged, and population. The department and committee structure of this organization corresponded closely with that of BCSP, and BCSP participated in its committee work. BCSP was dependent on the Welfare and Health Council, and its successor, the Greater New York Community Council, for the bulk of its funding. As of December 31, 1956, the Council stopped funding BCSP and the other borough councils, and they disbanded. (See Series 2, financial files for funding; see subseries 4.2 for other borough councils.)

This subseries includes correspondence with and information about BCSP's sister agencies in other boroughs, including: Bronx Welfare and Health Council; Community Welfare Council of Staten Island; Queensboro Council for Social Welfare; and several Manhattan neighborhood community councils. This decentralization through regional councils helped to improve the overall effectiveness and efficiency of health and welfare planning in New York City. Files include some correspondence with these agencies about mutual concerns, as well as newsletters, reports, and related material.

This very miscellaneous grouping of files contains general information on similar organizations in other American cities including: Boston, United Community Services of Metropolitan Boston; Cincinnati, Council of Social Agencies; Los Angeles, Department of Recreation and Parks; Philadelphia, Health and Welfare Council and the University of Pennsylvania School of Social Work; and Pittsburgh, Health and Welfare Federation of Allegheny County. Files contain primarily pamphlets issued by these organizations.

These files include general information and correspondence regarding the overall coordination of local neighborhood councils by BCSP, as well as chronicling the debate about the administrative hierarchy of the various welfare and health councils in New York City and in Brooklyn. Also included here are publications from other cities on the concept of neighborhood councils, and reports and statistics on Brooklyn and its welfare and health needs, including "Brooklyn Neighborhoods," by Herbert J. Ballon, containing detailed neighborhood-by-neighborhood assessments [no date, probably mid-1940s], and "Composition and Resources of Brooklyn," by Amy E. Krueger [1931], giving a summary of Brooklyn's "resources and of its composition that may be helpful to social workers."

The Brownsville-Canarsie-East New York Coordinating Board was an administrative body formed to oversee the activities of the local health councils in these areas. Initially a unified body, it was later decentralized to allow greater autonomy in each separate neighborhood. The files in this subseries include correspondence regarding meetings of the Board, minutes, summaries of activities of the councils in Brownsville, Canarsie and East New York, and lists of members.

BCSP did many neighborhood studies to assess health and welfare needs in varying parts of Brooklyn. To address these needs, BCSP acted as an advisor and a force in the creation of several neighborhood health and welfare councils in Brooklyn, including the Brownsville Health and Welfare Council, Canarsie Health Council, East New York Health Council, and the Fort Greene-Farragut Coordinating Committee (The files for Fort Greene were left in subseries 3.3, Programs: Group Work and Recreation, where they were found). BCSP also served as a consultant to Bedford-Stuyvesant Neighborhood Council, and the Eastern Parkway-Crown Heights Intergroup Council. These neighborhood councils were instrumental in setting up local day care centers, recreation centers, senior centers, and nursery schools. These files, which contain correspondence, reports, committee records, minutes, bylaws, surveys, pamphlets, and related material, document BCSP's participation in bringing health and welfare services to communities on a neighborhood level. Services in more than thirty Brooklyn neighborhoods are covered.

Files for the councils directly affiliated with BCSP (Brownsville, Canarsie, East New York) are substantial, and include documentation on efforts to establish programs such as blood banks; classes on diabetes, nutrition, obesity, home nursing, and other topics; protection and establishment of neighborhood services including fire protection, sewers, and clean-ups; and local health and mental health clinics. The group on Bedford-Stuyvesant documents the Bedford-Stuyvesant Area Project on Juvenile Delinquency, the work of the Citizens Committee for a Municipal Hospital, the Maria Lawton Center for Older People, and the Bedford-Stuyvesant Community Center.

Arranged by city agency, these files contain press clippings, reports, publications and some correspondence with various units of city government, including the New York City Youth Board, regarding prevention and control of juvenile delinquency; Board of Estimate, regarding budgets; the committee on Inter-group relations, the Mayor's Committee on Unity, and the Board of Education, on school integration; Health Department, regarding summer day camp, day care, and tuberculosis screening in Bedford-Stuyvesant; Housing Authority, regarding public housing projects; and the New York Police Department, regarding the Police Athletic League (PAL), and the Juvenile Aid Bureau. Also included are files on the Community Mental Health Board, Domestic Relations Court; Welfare Department; and the Department of Hospitals.

This rather miscellaneous collection of limited correspondence, reports, newsletters, and publications includes the state departments of Commerce, Education, Health, Housing, Mental Health, Parole, Social Welfare, and Youth an Delinquency. Also included is material on a Temporary Commission to simplify the court system (1955); the Commission Against Discrimination, and labor market development reports.

This subseries includes a Department of Defense brochure on nuclear fallout protection; Korean War era Veterans Administration material; and pamphlets on health issues, forms, guidelines and limited correspondence with the Department of Health, Education and Welfare.

Correspondence between BCSP staff and various faculty and staff members at Brooklyn College reveal the close relationship between the two, as BCSP staff were recruited to speak to students on topics relating to community organization and social work, as well as encouraging students to be involved as volunteers (see General correspondence, 1945-57). Louise Simsar, Executive Secretary of BCSP served on the College's Advisory Placement Committee (see committee correspondence, 1948-56), which explored vocational opportunities for college students in business and professional fields, especially the increased need for employees in service occupations. Also included are press clippings and several Brooklyn College publications.

The Brooklyn Public Library was a member of BCSP, and collaborated with BCSP on projects for the Puerto Rican community; a directory of summer recreation services; and a bibliography of books and materials for new social service workers entitled "Getting acquainted with Brooklyn." Correspondence includes letters about and minutes of the Committee for Brooklyn Public Library Week (1953), and acknowledgments for BCSP publications contributed to the library. Also included are press clippings and several BPL publications and flyers.

Organized in 1936-37, the Greater New York Fund (GNYF) began operation in 1938, and served to solicit contributions from businesses and employee groups for distribution to over four hundred New York City health and welfare agencies, including voluntary hospitals, services for children and the aged, and health care services. This subseries includes a report on tentative plans for the founding of the Fund (1937); correspondence with BCSP regarding GNYF activities, fundraising and contributions from BCSP (1946-57); sample applications for participation in the fund, press clippings, and GNYF pamphlets, flyers and newsletters. A 1948 GNYF report of the Sub-Committee to Study the Problem of Imbalance of Services in New York with Special Reference to Borough Imbalance, includes detailed statistical and census information on population, socio-economic status, housing, economic factors, health care, children's services, delinquency, and education. Also included are reports on the distribution of family services, health care services, group work and recreation services, the care of children, and services for the aged.

Founded 1910, the Urban League of Greater New York, was an affiliate of the National Urban League, the oldest and largest American interracial social service agency. It was a member of the Welfare and Health Council of New York City and a participant in (i.e., funded by) the Greater New York Fund. The Urban League's stated mission was to win equal opportunity for all Americans in employment, housing (it opposed slum clearance and housing projects), education, and health and welfare services. Its programs were historically centered on African-Americans; during the period covered here, it began to expand its programs to include Puerto Ricans as well. The material in this subseries includes correspondence and related material regarding BCSP's participation in Urban League programs including the Urban League's Group Work Advisory Committee (1947-49), and the Brooklyn Coordinating Committee on Fair Housing (1956-57), which advocated the New York State Metcalf-Baker bills and housing desegregation. Also included are press clippings, and Urban League publications and newsletters.

Subseries 7.5 is comprised of files on over 250 wide ranging voluntary agencies, schools and school groups, civic associations, religious social service agencies, business and professional organizations, local chapters of national social welfare organizations, and YM/YWCAs and YM/YWHAs. Contents of the files vary, but generally include information about the organization, its purpose and programs; press clippings; and limited correspondence with BCSP. Organizations represented by more substantial files include Citizens for AllDay Neighborhood Schools; American Jewish Congress; Association for the Help of Retarded Children, Inc.; Association of American Social Workers; Brooklyn Association for Mental Hygiene, Inc.; Brooklyn Child Guidance League; Brooklyn Jewish Community Council; Brooklyn Juvenile Protection Agency; Brooklyn Museum; Brooklyn Tuberculosis and Health Association, Inc.; Citizens Committee for Children of New York City; Citizens' Housing and Planning Council of New York, Inc.; National Publicity Council for Health and Welfare Services, Inc.; New York CIO Council; Community Association of School Districts 25 and 27; and Youth for Better Citizens of Tomorrow.