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By John Sullivan
Times Herald-Record
September 07, 2007
Kiryas Joel — A native of this Satmar Hasidic village, Toby Greenberg is not unfamiliar with the strict mores of her ultra-Orthodox community.

But she never expected to be persecuted for choosing to dress slightly differently.

Unlike most Kiryas Joel women, who wear long, dark dresses or skirts and simple blouses in public, Greenberg, 25, wears colorful shirts, wigs and denim skirts.

Kiryas Joel dress customs
The principle of strict, Orthodox Jewish law that covers women's dress requires all women, especially married women, to dress as modestly as possible so as not to stand out.

Long dresses are preferred over a skirt and blouse. If the latter is chosen, then the sleeves of the shirt should go past the elbows, and the women should wear opaque stockings with a seam in the back.

Most Hasidic women do not wear red, or anything reddish, since the color is associated with prostitution in traditional Jewish communal life.

Satmar women have to shave their hair. They are also required to wear distinguishable wigs, covered by a hat or kerchief, known as a "tichel," when out in public. Wigs that are too natural-looking defeat the purpose - to help avoid attractiveness to other men, in accordance with the law. John Sullivan
And that, in the eyes of a clandestine group of inquisitors, constitutes immoral behavior.

Greenberg and her husband, Yoel, awoke Tuesday morning to find the tires of their silver Chevy Impala slashed and white oil-based paint splashed on their new, black Mazda CX-7.

Written in white paint on the Mazda were Hebrew words that Greenberg interpreted in English as "get out" and "defiled person."

State police Sgt. Warner Hein said troopers are treating the incident as criminal mischief and are interviewing residents for potential leads.

Troopers are also investigating another incident that occurred about a month ago, in which fliers slandering Greenberg were thrown on Kiryas Joel's streets.

Just before this week's vandalism, Greenberg and her husband received several letters — one was hand-delivered by a Hasidic man.

The man told them that he and 24 other men have decided that the couple should leave Kiryas Joel immediately.

"He had a lot of guts coming up here in person," Yoel said.

Kiryas Joel, a village in the Town of Monroe, is populated by about 20,000 observant Satmar Hasidic Jews.

Kiryas Joel residents hold fast to strict customs considered by many other Hasidim as outdated or archaic.

The Greenbergs said they do not believe that their persecutors are representative of Kiryas Joel, but are rather a fringe group of radicals who have taken it upon themselves to make an example of them.

The couple at first suspected the attacks to be the work of Vaad Hatznius, the equivalent of a morality police group in the village.

But when Toby's family confronted members of the group, they denied responsibility for the acts, she said.

Still, Vaad Hatznius has been suspected of acting through other agents of the community to achieve its ends, she said.

Speaking with a reporter yesterday, Toby wore a bright pink Tommy Hilfiger long-sleeved shirt, a denim skirt with ruffles at the knees and a wig with a copper tint.

Yoel, who works in construction, stood by her, as their 1-year-old daughter, Zlaty, played.

The couple at first thought about ignoring the threats, but changed their minds after their cars were vandalized.

"I want these people arrested," Toby said.

"I want them to pay for my damaged property and to pay for what they are putting my family through."

Professor Sam Heilman, an expert in Hasidic culture at the City University of New York, said Toby Greenberg's plight is not unusual given Kiryas Joel's suspiciousness of change, no matter how slight.

"The whole image she is projecting with her clothing is that of someone who's at home in the modern world, and there are many who are afraid of that in Kiryas Joel," he said.

Map of Location in NY

SVATS

Looking for a house last Sepetmber I visited the area. Nice area , lots of problems.

A few more statistics from wikipedia

Kiryas Joel (also known as Kiryas Yo'el or KJ) (Hebrew: קרית יואל, "Town of Joel") is a village within the Town of Monroe in Orange County, New York, United States. The great majority of its residents are Hasidic Jews who strictly observing Torah and its commandmentss, and belong to the worldwide Satmar Hasidic dynasty, making it a significant Satmar enclave.

Most of the residents speak Yiddish as their first language. The village has the youngest median age (15.0) of any population center of over 5,000 residents in the United States.[1] Large families are the norm, as in all ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities.

History
Kiryas Joel is named for Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum, the rebbe of Satmar and driving spirit behind the project. Teitelbaum himself helped select the location a few years before his death in 1979. Rabbi Teitelbaum was the founding rebbe of the Satmar Hasidic dynasty, originally from Hungary. The Satmars who established Kiryas Joel came from Szatmarnemeti, Hungary (now Satu Mare, Romania), Teitelbaum's hometown, whose 12,000 Jewish residents were deported to Auschwitz.

In 1946, Teitelbaum originally settled with his followers in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. By the 1970s, however, he decided to move the growing community to a location that was not far from the commercial center of New York City but was also more secluded from what he saw as the harmful influences and immorality of the outside world. Teitelbuam's choice was Monroe. The land for Kiryas Joel was purchased in 1977, and fourteen Satmar families settled there. By 2006, there were over 3,000. When he died in 1979, Rabbi Teitelbaum was the first person to be buried in the town's cemetery. His funeral reportedly brought over 100,000 mourners to Kiryas Joel at that time.

It is widely believed that no candidates run for the village's board or the school board unless first approved by the grand rebbe Rabbi Aron Teitelbaum In 2001, Kiryas Joel held a competitive election in which all candidates supported by the grand rebbe were re-elected by a 60-40% margin.[2]

The village has become a contentious issue in Orange County for several reasons, mainly related to its rapid growth.[3] Unlike most other small towns, it lacks a real downtown and much of it is given over to residential property, which has mostly taken the form of contemporary townhouse-style condominium complexes similar to those found in ski resort communities in western states. New construction is going on throughout the community.

Population growth is strong. In 1990, there were 7,400 people in Kiryas Joel; in 2000, 13,100, nearly doubling the population. In 2005, the population had risen to 18,300, a rate of growth suggesting it will double again in the ten years between 2000 and 2010.[3] In 2006, village administrator Gedalye Szegedin stated:

“ There are three religious tenets that drive our growth: our women don't use birth control, they get married young and after they get married, they stay in Kiryas Joel and start a family. Our growth comes simply from the fact that our families have a lot of babies, and we need to build homes to respond to the needs of our community. . . . As each successive generation of women becomes old enough to have children, the number of women of child-bearing age grows exponentially. The number of women who marry each year is the approximate number of new homes needed.[3] ”

Local impact of growth

Monroe also contains two other villages, Monroe and Harriman. Kiryas Joel's boundaries also come close to the neighboring towns of Blooming Grove and Woodbury.

Residents of these communities and local and Orange County politicians view the village as encroaching on them.[3] Due to the rapid population growth occurring in Kiryas Joel, resulting almost entirely from the high birth rates of its Hasidic population, the village government has undertaken various annexation efforts to expand its area, to the dismay of the majority of the residents of the surrounding communities. Many of these area residents see the expansion of the high-density residential and commercial village as a threat to the quality of life in the surrounding suburban communities. They view it as a prime source of suburban sprawl (most land surrounding it is largely undeveloped). This designation is questionable, because the high density townhouses and condominiums of Kiryas Joel take up much less space per person than the typical suburban community. Only 5.4% of housing units in Kiryas Joel are single, detached houses,[4], a lower percentage than the Bronx (where 5.8% of housing units are single detached houses). (Detached single housing is a component of sprawl, but not the only component.) Other concerns of the surrounding communities are the impact on local aquifers and the projected increased volume of sewage reaching the county’s sewerage treatment plants, already near capacity by 2005.

On August 11, 2006, residents of Woodbury voted by a 3-to-1 margin to incorporate much of the town as a village to constrain further annexation. Kiryas Joel has vigorously opposed such moves in court,.[citation needed] and even some Woodbury residents are concerned about adding another layer of taxation without any improved defense against annexations.

In March 2007, the village sued the county to stop it from selling off a million gallons (3,780 m³) of excess capacity at its sewage plant in Harriman. Two years before, the county had sued the village to stop it from tapping into New York City's Catskill Aqueduct, arguing that the village's environmental review for the project had inadequately addressed concerns about the additional wastewater it would generate. The village is appealing an early ruling siding with the county.[5]

In its action, Kiryas Joel accuses the county of inconsistently claiming limited capacity in the its suit when it is selling the million gallons to three communities outside its sewer district.

[edit] Local politics
Critics of the village cite its impact on local politics. Villagers are perceived as voting in a solid bloc. While this is not always the case, the highly concentrated population often does skew strongly toward one candidate or the other in local elections, making Kiryas Joel a heavily-courted swing vote for whichever politician offers Kiryas Joel the most favorable environment for continued growth.

Kiryas Joel played a major role in the 2006 Congressional election. The village sits in the 19th Congressional District, represented at that time by Republican Sue Kelly. Village residents have usually been loyal to Kelly in the past, but the voters were upset over what they saw as lack of adequate representation from Kelly for the village. In a bloc, Kiryas Joel swung around 2,900 votes to Democrat John Hall in the 2006 elections. Hall won the election by over 4,000 votes, but Kiryas Joel was the primary reason Hall carried Orange County. He defeated Kelly in the county by 93 votes.

Large families

Grand Rabbi Aaron Teitelbaum, celebrating Hanukah in the main synagogue in Kiryas JoelWomen usually stop working outside the home after the birth of a second child.[3] Most families have only one income and many children. The resulting poverty rate makes a disproportionate number of families in Kiryas Joel eligible for welfare benefits when compared to the rest of the county; and cost of welfare benefits is subsidized by taxes paid county-wide. The New York Times wrote,

“ Because of the sheer size of the families (the average household here has six people, but it is not uncommon for couples to have 8 or 10 children), and because a vast majority of households subsist on only one salary, 62 percent of the local families live below poverty level and rely heavily on public assistance [government welfare], which is another sore point among those who live in neighboring communities.[3]

Litigation
The unusual lifestyle and growth pattern of Kiryas Joel has led to litigation on a number of fronts. Most noted in legal circles is the Grumet decision about school district boundaries; but there has also been litigation over what entity should pay for the education of children with disabilities in Kiryas Joel, and over whether the community's boys must ride buses driven by women.[3]

Main article: Board of Education of Kiryas Joel Village School District v. Grumet
In 1994, the Supreme Court ruled that the Kiryas Joel school district, which covered only the village, was designed in violation of the Establishment Clause of the 1st Amendment, because the design accommodated one group on the basis of religious affiliation. 512 U.S. 687 (1994). Subsequently, the New York State Legislature established a similar school district in the town that has passed legal muster.[6]

Demographics

Grave of Grand Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum (r.) and his wife, Rebbetzin Alte Feiga Teitelbaum (l.) in Kiryas Joel Cemetery.As of the census[8] of 2000, there were 13,138 people, 2,229 households, and 2,137 families residing in the village. The population density was 11,962.2 people per square mile (4,611.5/km²). There were 2,233 housing units at an average density of 2,033.2/sq mi (783.8/km²). The racial makeup of the village was 99.02% White, 0.21% African American, 0.02% Asian, 0.12% from other races, and 0.63% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 0.93% of the population.

Kiryas Joel is the place in the United States with the highest percentage of people who reported Hungarian ancestry with 18.9% of the population reporting Hungarian ancestry in 2000.[9]

The 2000 census also reports that only 6.16% of the village speaks English at home; 2.3% speak Hebrew; over 89% speak Yiddish at home.[10] Of the Yiddish-speaking population in 2000, 46% spoke English "not well" or "not at all." Overall, including those who primarily spoke Hebrew and European languages as well as primary Yiddish speakers, 46% of Kiryas Joel residents speak English "not well" or "not at all."[11]

There were 2,229 households out of which 79.5% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 93.2% were married couples living together, 1.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 4.1% were non-families. 2.8% of all households were made up of individuals and 2.1% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 5.74 and the average family size was 5.84. In the village the population was spread out with 57.5% under the age of 18, 17.2% from 18 to 24, 16.5% from 25 to 44, 7.2% from 45 to 64, and 1.6% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 15 years. For every 100 females there were 116.3 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 118.0 males.

The median income for a household in the village was $15,138, and the median income for a family was $15,372. Males had a median income of $25,043 versus $16,364 for females. The per capita income for the village was $4,355. About 61.7% of families and 62.2% of the population were below the poverty line, including 63.9% of those under age 18 and 50.5% of those age 65 or over.

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