This series contains materials from Gorelick's tenure with the City of New York. It primarily consists of City of New York documents, but also contains information and instructions from state and federal social welfare departments. The series contains materials from the 1940s-1980s, but the bulk are from the 1960s-1970s.

The City of New York was an extremely bureaucratic entity, an attribute that fundamentally shaped its labor relations with social service employees and the relationship between welfare clients and city employees. The memorandums, directives, and correspondence found here illustrate working conditions of social service employees and processes for administering welfare (also termed income maintenance). Because the need for welfare was connected with many other social issues, these records illustrate social conditions in mid-20th century New York City, including poverty, health, housing, employment, and crime.

The Fulton Center, on Willoughby Street in Brooklyn, and the Boro Hall Center on Jay Street in Brooklyn are particularly well-represented. Gorelick held several positions at Boro Hall and was director at Fulton during the 1970s. The Brownsville Center is also represented to a lesser extent. These local centers were where clients interacted with the city's policies.

Departments are arranged alphabetically, but due to the evolution of the city government, similar functions are represented by content generated by different departments. The functions of the Department of Welfare would gradually be moved into the Department of Human Resources Administration/Department of Social Services, which was created in 1966 and fully consolidated in 1970. The local centers, such as Fulton, Boro Hall, or Brownsville, were at times under the auspices of the Department of Welfare, the Department of Social Services, or the Human Resources Administration.

Advocacy and professional organizations for government employees are also included in this series. These include the Department of Welfare's branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Association of Supervisor's of the Department of Welfare. This group, formed "to advance professional growth and to protect the Civil Service rights of members," illustrates the often fine line between professional organization and union activities.

This series documents Sol Gorelick's union activities during his tenure with the City of New York's social service departments. It contains a wide range of documentation, including meeting minutes, contracts, forms, pamphlets, fliers, newsletters, conference materials, and correspondence. The best represented unions are the Welfare Local 371, the Social Service Employees Union, Local 371, and their parent organization American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, District Council 37.

Gorelick joined the United Public Workers union when he joined the Department of Welfare, and there is one folder of materials regarding this union. The Welfare Local 371 of AFSCME, DC 37 (1955-1969) is particularly well-represented. These materials include negotiation documentation, contracts, publications, and committee materials. There are six folders of material on the Social Service Employees Union (1961-1969), that for a time competed with Local 371 for members from the Department of Welfare. In 1969, Local 371 and the SSEU merged. The resulting union, SSEU Local 371 is also well represented. Documentation includes the local's newsletter, chapter and committee materials, and leaflets. The is also a significant amount of material form AFSCME, DC 37, the AFL-CIO-affiliated parent union of Local 371 and SSEU Local 371.

There is small amount of additional material from other social service locals, unions outside of the social services, and peace advocacy activities in the trade union movement.

This series documents Gorelick's activities in the professional organization the National Association of Social Workers. The bulk of the documents date from the mid-1970s to early 1980s. Gorelick was active in the NASW's New York City Chapter, and the majority of the series pertains to chapter activities.

Lobbying activities of the national organization and New York City Chapter are represented in folders for the Education Legislative Action Network (ELAN). Gorelick was chair of the Welfare Policy Committee, and the committee's activities are well-documented. There are minutes for meetings of the chapter's Welfare Policy Committee, Executive Committee, and Board of Directors, among other groups. Publications present include the national organization's Advocate for Human Services, the New York City Chapter's newsletter Currents, and ELAN's ELAN Alert. The series also contains correspondence, documentation of planning activities for conferences, fliers, pamphlets, and policy statements. Gorelick's professional organization interests often overlapped with union activity and employment with the city. This series illustrates how activism and public policy concerns found outlets across different spheres.

Gorelick's involvement in community work and engagement with progressive causes went beyond his professional and union activities. This series documents additional organizations and subjects that Gorelick was involved with or monitored. Types include neighborhood and community organizations, social work professional organizations, nonprofit social service organizations, health and healthcare, politics, peace, and education.

The Brooklyn Tuberculosis and Lung Association is particularly well represented. Gorelick was active in the leadership of the organization, and served as secretary and president. Materials are mostly from the 1970s and encompass the full range of organizational and informational documents, including correspondence, pamphlets, the In Short monthly newsletter, meeting minutes, audits, clippings, and documents from other organizations concerned with eliminating tuberculosis and smoking.

A notable amount of material documents activism in the United States opposed to Augusto Pinochet's 1973 coup in Chile. Social workers' professional organizations, unions, and groups throughout the left advocated for intervention to prevent human rights abuses. These materials contain publications, clippings, correspondence, and other material from groups concerned with the situation in Chile.