Unemployed and Welfare Council organizers Gail Elberg (l.) and Lorraine Stevens (r.).

Gail Elberg is the director and creator of the All Stars Project’s Talented Volunteers -- one of the country’s most honored volunteer programs.

It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that Gail has been preparing for this position all her life.

“For as long as I can remember, I have been concerned about the underdog, the poor, the have-nots. I wanted to do something that made a difference in people’s lives – and the world.”

Gail, who was raised in a working-class Jewish family in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, began her journey as a social and community activist at the age of twenty when she signed up to become a VISTA volunteer. With VISTA Gail worked for over a year at the Fallon Indian Reservation in Nevada where she organized cultural enrichment field trips for the reservation’s children and served as an administrative assistant to the chief.

A few months after returning to New York City, in early 1971, Gail spotted an ad in the Village Voice that she found intriguing. It was a call for teachers who sought an “out of the box” educational opportunity. She answered the ad and soon met the philosopher Fred Newman and a handful of his activist colleagues who were part of the Summerhill Collective. Newman was a Stanford University Ph D. who taught philosophy at the college level for a number of years. Politicized by the social movements of the 60’s, Newman left the academy — and the campus — to work in the community. He began to organize other intellectuals and activists to join him in creating new kinds of organizations that could develop — and empower — the poorest sectors of the community.

Answering the ad was the beginning of what has become a more than 30-year friendship and collaboration with Newman who went on to co-found the All Stars Project..

Within a few years, Newman, Elberg and a hand-full of other activists created what was to become the New York City Unemployed and Welfare Council (NYCUWC), a new kind of union designed to give a voice to the chronically unemployed and welfare recipients of New York City. Gail, who would become a lead organizer of the NYCUWC recalls: “We learned that there was an entire stratum of the population — mostly people of color — who were being systematically written off…Yes, there were social programs and job training programs — for some — but we came to learn that society related to this stratum of the population [the chronically unemployed] as untrainable and unemployable.”

Newman, Elberg and the other activists were determined to bring the voice of this “permanent underclass” into New York’s civic and political life. Over the life of the NYCUWC, thousands of New York City’s poorest became unionized. Gail also played an important role in helping new leaders emerge from the ranks of the NYCUWC, such as the late Neter Brooks, a mother of 14 from Georgia who was the NYCUWC’s first president; and Lorraine Stevens of East New York, Brooklyn, who remains active with the All Stars Project to this day.

“The All Stars Project can trace its origins directly to the NYCUWC,” says Elberg. “We had many conversations with NYCUWC members many of whom had been on public assistance and were now leaders and colleagues.” Disturbed by the lack of options available to the young people of the poor communities, they asked Elberg and Newman to meet with the youth from the communities. “When we started talking to the young people,” Gail remembers, “we asked them, ‘What can we do together?’ A lot of the kids said, ‘We want to put on a talent show.’ So we responded to that by helping the youth put on some talent shows. In short order we began to see some brand new possibilities.”

“But creating a stable youth program that could, in an on-going way, produce cultural events for lots of kids, required money,” says Elberg. So Newman and others came up with a fundraising plan that involved going directly to the community for support. “We set up tables on street corners — in front of Zabars, Bloomingdales and banks — and spoke to passers by asking them for donations. We also trained a team of volunteer canvassers to knock on the doors of private homes throughout the tri-state area and ask the middle income and well-to-do city suburbanites to support our brand new cultural program for inner city youth. “And,” Elberg exclaimed, “they did!” The overwhelmingly positive and generous responses from the people that were met — on the street and at the door — enabled the community organizers to not only build the All Stars Talent Show Network but to further develop the All Stars Project, eventually spawning such programs as the Development School For Youth and the Castillo Theatre. “We weren’t just looking to create a stage for the kids to perform,” Gail explains. “We were still looking to change the world. We hadn’t lost that.”

While the All Stars Project still has a core group of volunteers (some of whom hail from those earliest days), it wasn’t until 1999 that Talented Volunteers came into being. In keeping with the All Stars’ philosophy that government dollars “will never substitute for the caring and commitment of ordinary individuals who want to give their time and energy to improve their communities,” Gail stresses the difference between the All Stars Project and many non-profit organizations. “The All Stars is, at its core, a volunteer organization. It’s very different in that regard. In fact’ virtually all of the All Stars employees spent many years volunteering for the organization prior to coming on staff.”

Reflecting on her life and on her work with the All Stars, Gail takes pride in the choices she’s made. “I love stepping back and looking at my life and at what I’m doing. I wouldn’t change it.” One could say that Gail’s life epitomizes the expression “If you find a job you love, you’ll never have to work a day in your life”— a view that, like Gail’s determination and heart, seems part of the core of the All Stars itself.