In 1983, fear, disease, hopelessness and chaos reigned in the horrific welfare hotels to which thousands of New York City’s homeless families were relegated. Led by Jack Doyle, the Red Cross responded to this crisis by establishing a model program of transitional housing and support services that included on-site day care, health services and effective rehousing assistance. As a member of Governor Cuomo’s Emergency Task Force on Homelessness and the Bar Association of New York City’s Committee on the Legal Problems of the Homeless, Doyle worked to alter state and city regulations so that money wasted on welfare hotels could be utilized for decent shelter. Today, through a network of 60 shelters operated by two dozen non-profit organizations, 5,000 homeless families find decent shelter each night of the year.

In the late ’70s, Doyle, his wife Bernice, and other Bronx “urban pioneers” renovated an abandoned apartment building. Today, he is the executive director of New Settlement Apartments managing 893 units of housing reclaimed from the burned-out and abandoned buildings.. New Settlement, a driving force in the rebirth of the Mt. Eden neighborhood in the Southwest Bronx, is building the community not just through bricks and mortar but through organizing residents, many of them new immigrants, after-school programs, parents’ action committees, arts projects and corporate mentoring programs.

Doyle, is also a member of the Board of Directors of the Coalition for the Homeless, and served 12 years as Chairman.

The grandson of immigrants to New York from Counties Cork (O’Sullivan), Clare (Doyle and Corry) and Longford (Kiernan), Jack is the second in his family whose efforts have been recognized by Irish America. His brother, Kevin, a lawyer who works on appeals for men and women on death row, was on our 1995 list of Top 100 Irish Americans.

Jack has two children, John Bernard, a piper, and Sharon Marie, a professional ballet dancer. His wife Bernice is a school psychologist who divides her professional time between a suburban school and a county jail.