The Economic Opportunity Commission of Nassau County, Inc. has been HELPING PEOPLE TO HELP THEMSELVES for fifty-nine years. It is important as we celebrate that we are careful to cherish historical events and ensure that they are not expunged or rewritten.
The story of the events leading up to the passage of the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964, which began our program, cannot be told without including the important names of Dr. Mart in Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X. Two martyrs in the cause of freedom, justice, and economic opportunity for all in the 1950s and 1960s without whom, two great leaders who are only now beginning to be recognized with the full respect that is due them, there would have been no Civil Rights Act and subsequently no Economic Opportunity Act and no Economic Opportunity Commission. Another great leader whose name is virtually unknown and rarely spoken today is the late great New York Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, who wrote the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964. This fact is not as well-known as it should be in the community, and we pause at this time in our development to remember the sacrifices made by this man whom the historians have chosen to overlook.
We must also remember the spectacular history of the Anti-Poverty Program in New York State. Early in the establishment of the program, it was recognized that the program itself would not be popular as it would establish a quasi-governmental structure that would be sure to give status quo politics a run for its money. And so, keeping the program legislatively organized and funded was to be a battle that was to take place every two years in Congress to ensure that the program of empowerment of the people would go forward.
The NEW YORK STATE ALLIANCE OF COMMUNITY ACTION PROGRAMS was established early in the 1970s as a unique organization which permitted board and staff to sit together around a table and to make decisions regarding the Anti-Poverty Program in the State of New York. This program was responsible for the March on Washington that continued the Anti-Poverty Program when President Richard Nixon declared, “The War was over.” Once again in 1976 when the President sent a zero-budget authorization to Congress. When President Ronald Reagan was successful in revoking the Economic Opportunity Act, in 1981, the New York State Alliance of Community Action Programs participated actively to secure the Federal Community Services Block Grant, independent of all of the other block grants established at that time and then organized the activities that led to the passage of the New York State Community Services Block Grant bill in a way that grandfathered in and enabled the more than forty Community Action Agencies in New York State to continue their work uninterrupted. This was accomplished with strong leadership from Nassau County’s EOC
A National movement was established through the efforts of New York State leaders which institutionalized the National Community Action Agency Executive Directors Association and the National Conference for Community Economic Development which still functions as a trade association for community economic development agencies such as CEDC, which were established under Title VII of the Economic Opportunity Act.
Our past is replete with African American heroes including our own Nassau County leaders. Our multitude of Board and Committee members have served without recompense, with devotion, dedication, and commitment.
Against this background filled with leaders, heroes, and martyrs, the Economic Opportunity Commission of Nassau County has participated in an effort that has resulted in lasting change in all the places that it has been able to reach, most particularly in Nassau County.
In 1964 the Economic Opportunity Act was signed into law by President Lyndon Baines Johnson who said, “It is important that all players play by the same rules.” The first grant received in Nassau County was a $75,000 Planning Grant which was given by Nassau County Executive Eugene Nickerson to the Health & Welfare Council which was instructed to set up a committee of leaders to develop an Anti-Poverty Program in Nassau County. This resulted in the establishment of the Economic Opportunity Commission as a program of the Health and Welfare Council. A tripartite board was formed, as required by the legislation, of one-third of government appointees, one-third of local agencies, and one-third of representatives of the poor. The plan provided for organizing Neighborhood Service Centers in the ten poorest communities in Nassau County. Poverty was judged in four ways, the number of people under the poverty level, the number of people living in overcrowded housing, the number of people over twenty-five years of age with less than an eighth-grade education, and the number of families living in poverty.
The first ten Neighborhood Centers were developed in the Five Towns, Freeport, Glen Cove, Hempstead, Long Beach, Manhasset, Port Washington, Roosevelt, Rockville Centre, and Westbury. For the most part, the Neighborhood Service Centers were set up in storefronts and were structured with a Director, a Secretary, and Employment, Housing, and Social Service Aides.
By 1969 the Action Council of Central Nassau had been formed to serve “the hidden poor” who lived in the central Nassau communities of Uniondale, East Meadow, Hicksville, and Levittown. In 1969 the Economic Opportunity Commission of Nassau County, Inc. was incorporated as a New York State not-for-profit corporation, separate and completely independent from the Health and Welfare Council, and was designated, by a Resolution of the Nassau County Board of Supervisors, the anti-poverty agency for Nassau County.
In 1970 the Board of Directors fought and won the battle for the first African American administrator of a major program in Nassau County. John L. Kearse became the Executive Director and set about fulfilling a commitment to the empowerment of the people. The CREDO was adopted by the Commission as its action plan for the future. All Neighborhood Service Centers were required to follow an election plan that shadowed the governmental election processes and would provide for true representation for the poor in the communities. The Neighborhood Service Center Boards of Directors were structured with 51% of this elected segment and 49% were agencies and others.
The Commission Board of Directors came to grips with the fact that poor people would never be relieved of poverty unless there was a way for money to be earned by the development of a climate of economic health and growth.
1970, the Commission Board of Directors began· to plan an economic development program. In 1971, CEDC, Incorporated was formed as the community economic development arm of EOC. In 1973, recognizing the need for a financial institution that would serve the community and assist the EOC to move toward self-sufficiency, CEDC Federal Credit Union was chartered as a low income financial institution with a field of membership covering Nassau County. The other goals embodied in CEDC included human resource development and land development.
The land development objective was carried out through the purchase of buildings in the communities for full-service community centers, child development Head Start Centers, a weatherization ware house and distribution center, and affordable housing through a program of renovation and new con construction. The major acquisitions were the EOC headquarters in Hempstead and the building known as the old Hempstead Bus Terminal Building which is the cornerstone of EOC’s move towards self-sufficiency.
In 1978, the Special Impact grant was terminated and CEDC has been an independent not-for-profit agency since that date.
During this period, EOC actively pursued the development of programs designed to meet the needs of the community. In 1971 the EOC was successful in persuading Governor Nelson Rockefeller to arrange for New York State to match the federal requirement for anti-drug programs which enabled the establishment of the Drug Prevention Through Education Programs that EOC has operated since that date.
In 1974, the EOC ran the first Energy pilot program which was to result in a nationwide Weatherization Program.
Head Start grew from a part-time program to a full-year, full-day program in ten centers. More than 1,000 people participate daily in local feeding pro gram. Each CAP has an emergency food pantry, pro grams for the elderly, and job programs. The advent of the HIV crisis saw the early development of education and counseling on this topic. Advocacy, outreach, and organization focused the programs toward HELPING PEOPLE HELP THEMSELVES.
During this critical period, the Economic Opportunity Commission of Nassau County, Inc., CEDC, Incorporated, and CEDC Federal Credit Union took their place in the life of Nassau County as institutions with community-controlled Boards of Directors. The low-income community of Nassau County had not previously been fully in control of any of the institutions or programs that affected their daily lives. The institutionalization of Nassau County’s Anti-Poverty Program and the development of a Community Action Agency, a Community Economic Development Corporation, and a Community Development Credit Union provided this opportunity for the first time in Nassau County.
The plan outlined in the CREDO was well on its way to implementation, empowerment was the order of the day, and there was a strong focus and emphasis on education personified by the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Scholarship Fund which was established in 1988. The Luenetta E. Miller Retirement Plan was established for members of the EOC staff, some of whom had been with the agency for twenty years at the time of its implementation. The Community Action Agency Insurance Group was established as an employee health plan designed to provide the means for good health care including mandatory preventive exams once a year. EOC and all of its delegate affiliates became the first drug-free program in Nassau County.
EOC’s efforts around human resource development resulted in staff and board, many of whom came out of early Head Start or CAP efforts in which they were encouraged to return to school, who have obtained high school diplomas, college degrees, and graduate degrees, and who now sit on school boards, housing authorities, councils, task forces and committees all over Nassau County.
Efforts toward community development continued and in 1981 a newly reconstructed Atrium was opened in the old Hempstead Bus Terminal. This modernization and CEDC’s diligence resulted in a major uplift for the Village of Hempstead and in the words of the legislation helped this Village to “stop its downward spiral and begin the slow upward climb toward parity” with its neighboring communities.
How can we determine the success of our move toward self-sufficiency? (sufficient unto one’s self) The Economic Opportunity Commission is controlled by its own Board of Directors. First, One-third of the Board of Directors, which represent their communities, develop a workplan. Then implement the plan with the financial assistance of federal, state, and local governmental funds, and with the assistance of a large corps of volunteers that include many members of its various councils, committees, and boards of directors.
CEDC, Incorporated similarly has a volunteer board of directors and is, however, much less dependent on government grants which have been few and far between for fifteen years. The current redevelopment efforts are being accomplished with government guarantees which as of this writing are loans at market rates rather than grants, although the loans are guaranteed by federal funds. The development of the EOC headquarters was accomplished by a combination of loans and grants, more than $1,000,000 of which must be repaid.
CEDC Federal Credit Union, operating under the National Credit Union Administration Act, is a cooperative, owned and controlled by its members, ninety percent of whom may be considered low-income and ninety percent of whom are minorities.
One of the most important elements of the credit union is a commitment to the development of a banking and financial future for the youth of the community through the establishment of a Youth Credit Union Program and a Head Start Savings Program, the effects of which bring children into awareness of this career avenue at the earliest possible age.
EOC is now operating its first franchise venture, Youth Entrepreneurial Services, Inc. DBA Blimpie. This is a training ground for young adults in the operating of a franchise including all facets of business development incl including inventory, licensing, sales, marketing, and food handling.
The Cow Bay programs in Port Washington provide another avenue toward self-sufficiency through Cow Bay Transportation and Cow Bay Maintenance which service the network, providing better than standard commercial service and help to support the Port Washington programs.
The most important effort in the empowerment of the people was the involvement of the program in locating plaintiffs for the 1991 lawsuit challenging Nassau County’s government under the Voting Rights and Civil Rights Acts. This resulted in the 1993 decision by Judge Arthur Spatt in Federal Court proclaiming the Nassau County Board of Supervisors an unconstitutional form of government. County Executive Gulotta, acting to carry out the charge of Judge Spatt, constituted the Nassau County Government Revision Commission and appointed John L. Kearse, Chief Executive Officer of EOC as a member. He was subsequently elected by the Commission members to be the Vice Chairman. The Commission developed a nineteen-member legislature and other important charter reforms. In 1994, the voting public of Nassau County endorsed the work of the Commission in a referendum with a vote of three to one.
The net result for the communities served by EOC was the establishment of two districts, District One and District Two, which will place two minority members in the new Nassau County Legislature providing representation of and for this segment of the population for the first time in the history of Nassau County.
The early months of 1995 saw the community working in a dedicated and committed manner to develop a Minority Nominating Convention which resulted in a platform, a pledge to represent the community, and the means for screening candidates who were then selected by the populations of Districts One and Two are to be submitted to the political leadership for placement on the ballot in November 1995. At that time historic and irrevocable change and permanent empowerment and self-sufficiency will have been achieved by the population served by the Economic Opportunity Commission of Nassau County, Inc.
In April 2007, Iris A. Johnson, was elected Chief Executive Officer/Executive Director of the EOC of Nassau County, Inc. She is the first African-American female to serve in this position. Her transition provided an opportunity for the EOC of Nassau County, Inc. to tackle new and old challenges that continued to serve as barriers to self-sufficiency. The following programs were implemented in response to a growing diversified community and increased emergent needs: John L. Kearse Scholarship Program, Restore to Life Re-entry Program, Stand Up and Reach Out Teen Suicide Prevention, Maternal and Infant Community Health Collaborative, Office for New Americans, Empire State After School Program, and the COVID-19 global pandemic.
Under Ms. Johnson’s leadership, the Agency has diversified its funding, addressed economic and social realities that exist in Nassau County, and forged innovative partnerships to carry out the work of its mission.
To date, the Economic Opportunity Commission of Nassau County, Inc.
In 2021, under the leadership of Eric Poulson, Acting Executive Director, the EOC received funding, to assist residents impacted by Hurricane Ida.
The chart plotted so many years ago remains the chartered course of the Economic Opportunity Commission of Nassau County, Inc. Although the methods may change, we remain steadfast in our goal — the elimination of poverty.
