Allan Appel Photo
Jay Vlock with Towers CEO Gus Keach-Longo at facility's 50th anniversary celebration.
Jay Irwin “Jim” Vlock lived a long life with dignity. He fought to make sure that thousands of other people got the same opportunity.
Vlock, a businessman and New Haven philanthropist, died Saturday at the age of 96. He was buried Thursday at the Grove Street cemetery after a graveside service led by Rabbi Herb Brockman.
He was born in New York City on Oct. 30, 1926, the son of Sidney and Anita (Zahn) Vlock and beloved brother to Roberta Gottlieb and sister-in-law Marion Wexler.
After earning undergraduate and master’s degrees at Cornell University, he went into business, eventually serving as president of Fox Steel Company. He was a leader in New Haven’s Jewish community and broader philanthropic efforts.
Vlock’s legacy includes serving as a founder of the Towers, a national model for quality nonprofit affordable senior housing (“the type of housing that the people involved in the planning would want to live in themselves”) that was built on Church Street in 1968 and continues going strong today.
He described how he came to work to create the Towers and champion affordable senior housing during at the complex’s 50th anniversary in 2018.
In 1964, he recalled, he was at a business conference among fellow architects in St. Louis when he learned there was $48 million in new federal legislation earmarked for senior housing built by nonprofit.s
“I was a member of [then Mayor] Dick Lee’s kitchen cabinet,” Vlock recalled. So he made an appointment with the mayor.
“Dick, do you know anything about senior housing?” he asked.
“ ‘I don’t,’ ” Vlock recalled Lee responding, “‘but I will in an hour.”
And in an hour Vlock said he received a phone call from the mayor: “Dick Lee said, ‘Get your ass down here.’”
Lee, who had connections in D.C., told Vlock to recruit a nonprofit to sponsor and to build the complex in the middle of city. Those were the requirements. The latter “so people can get to see their parents and not forget about them in the sticks” and also so they can walk into New Haven. Vlock convinced Linda Kantor of the Jewish Community Council to have that organization sign on, and the project was born — which included fighting with federal funders to allow for the communal dining and on-site medical facilities that have contributed to the complex’s success.
In 1975, Vlock made the case for more federal funding for this kind of housing to members of the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Appropriations at a public hearing.
““It has been said that we spend one-third of our life growing up and two-thirds growing old. There is an overwhelming need and demand for adequate housing for older people — more urgent than for other segments of the population. Furthermore, planning must be done now for tomorrow’s elderly who will have higher expectations and different needs,” Vlock testified.
“Despite the American tradition of correcting the injustices of society, older people have been short-changed on their needs and expectations by an ineffective system which is lacking in sensitivity and understanding. We need not look far to see old people who cannot cope with the maze of bureaucracy; who are not mobile enough to travel to take care of their needs; who lack proper nutrition to lead healthy lives; who are alienated from society; who reside in ‘cubby holes’ — waiting to die.”
Among his many other philanthropic efforts, he funded a Yale Architectural School program in his name in which students design and build homes for families in low-income families.
Jim, married to the late Laurel Fox Vlock, is survived by his wife Gail Brekke. He also leaves his loving children Daniel Vlock (Joyce Myers) and Sandra Vlock; accomplished and adoring grandchildren Jonathan Vlock, Elizabeth Vlock, Andrew Vlock, Allison Schwartz, Dana Springer, Julia Vlock, Teddy Vlock, Adam Arbonies and Mira Arbonies; and great grandchildren Olivia, Isabelle, Matilda, Abram, and Zelda plus numerous nieces and nephews. We also remember Jim’s son, the late Michael Vlock (husband of Karen Pritzker) and son-in-law, Glenn Arbonies (husband of Sandra Vlock). Memorial contributions may be sent to The New Haven Independent (c/o 51 Elm St., 3rd floor, New Haven CT 06510), in lieu of flowers. To sign an online registry book or to leave a message of condolence, please visit www.shurefuneralhome.com.