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November 17, 2009
On any given Wednesday on Pico Boulevard, a line of people starts snaking out of the SOVA food pantry early in the morning. Some of the people are homeless, some are dressed for work, some have kids with them. Some are Jewish, many are not, and all of them are there on a monthly visit to take home a week’s worth of free canned and dry goods, fresh produce, baked goods and meat.
Ending hunger in Los Angeles is a pretty ambitious goal. Yet The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles is staking its identity on a new campaign, titled “Fed Up With Hunger,” that launched in September during the High Holy Days. Spreading the word through reusable shopping bags, strategically placed banners and a full calendar of events, Federation leaders are hoping that this obviously urgent and highly visible target will capture a new spirit at The Jewish Federation and help usher in a revitalized identity for the umbrella fundraising organization, one that will endure into the 21st century.
The Jewish community of Santa Clarita Valley could take a big step forward next year. Plans for a new Southern California Center for Jewish Life (SCCJL) include a complex designed by renowned architect Hagy Belzberg with a new home for Temple Beth Ami as well as an independent community cultural center, a public Hebrew-language charter school, an early childhood education center and 140 senior apartments. Groundbreaking for the $54 million project on a 19-acre property approximately five minutes north of Granada Hills is planned for late 2010. With the current Jewish population of Santa Clarita reaching close to 20,000, the new center would fill a big gap in the emerging community, as well as attract newcomers.
Steven F. Windmueller, a prominent figure in Jewish communal and academic life, will retire as the Los Angeles campus dean of the Reform movement’s Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion on July 1.
State investigators reported last week that they have no evidence to prove that Eden Memorial Park in Mission Hills mishandled graves, as alleged in a class-action lawsuit filed against the cemetery’s owners in September.
The dean of the Los Angeles campus of the Reform movement’s Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion is retiring.
Former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush have canceled their joint public lecture in Los Angeles, but the sponsoring American Jewish University (AJU) believes that the cancellation rests on a misunderstanding and is working to reverse the presidential decisions.
The Friendship Circle of Los Angeles, a program that pairs teen volunteers with kids with special needs, now includes an after-school supplementary Jewish education program. The Friendship Circle Hebrew School opened Nov. 9 with separate boys and girls classes for kids with moderate to severe conditions such as autism, Asperger’s, Down syndrome and pervasive developmental delays.
Los Angeles police are still trying to find a smooth-talking crook who stole $26,000 in cash, jewelry and watches from the Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv basketball team.
Over the next five years, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), the four-campus academic flagship of the Reform movement, will tighten its institutional belt by slimming down its faculty and administration, selling off real estate and instituting “electronic” classes.
Statements from the Rabbis.
Israeli Consul General of Los Angeles Jacob Dayan personally invited the 18 L.A. rabbis from Orthodox, Reform and Conservative streams of Judaism to come to Israel for 58 hours last week, but the consulate’s mission to transmit a message of solidarity with Israel had other results too. By the end of the short trip, many of the rabbis expressed a deeper understanding of the important social problems facing Israel today, as well as a renewed hope for peace and a rejuvenated passion for the thriving Zionist dream.
The L.A. Jewish community remained on alert this week as police continued their hunt for a gunman who shot and wounded two congregants at a Sephardic synagogue the San Fernando Valley.
After being laid off from her job as a network-programming engineer, Jennifer Imbag asked God what she should do with her life. One night soon afterward, she dreamed she was in a white coat in a white room. Not yet understanding what the dream meant, she continued on the search for her next step, only to have the message made clearer by a fortune cookie that read, “You could prosper in the field of medicine.”
Administrators at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), have sent information to the FBI alleging that members of the university’s Muslim Student Union (MSU) collected money at a campus event, which was given to an organization that provided funds to Hamas.
The Anti-Defamation League expressed deep concern about the shooting this morning at Adat Yeshurun Valley Sephardic synagogue in North Hollywood.
The Los Angeles police bomb squad searched the premises of Wilshire Boulevard Temple after the synagogue’s security guards reported an unattended canvas shopping bag lying inside the gate.
The Los Angeles Police Department has issued an alert to all Jewish day schools and synagogues after two men were shot early this morning in the parking lot of Adat Yeshurun Valley Sephardic synagogue.
Two people were shot in the legs at a synagogue in North Hollywood, Calif.
The Police Commission and the Mayor are reaching out as they consider possible finalists to succeed LAPD Chief Bill Bratton. One person who should be on their call list but isn’t is Gene Bartow.
It’s a long way to fly for a home game, but that was the effect when Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv’s players walked into Staples Center, more than 7,500 miles from Israel, to play the Clippers in an exhibition game on Tuesday, Oct. 20. Rather than wearing the blue uniforms normally associated with a Maccabi away game, the players wore home gold, which gave the superficial appearance of a Lakers-Clippers match-up.
Supermodel turned supermogul Kathy Ireland has been named the international ambassador of Holyland Heroes, a new Friends of Sheba Medical Center campaign to raise awareness and support of wounded soldiers and victims of terror being treated at Sheba’s National Center for Rehabilitation.
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, a widely respected Jewish institution, is facing lawsuits, investigations and embarrassment after heavy overdoses of radiation administered to 206 patients went undetected for 18 months.
California Assemblymen Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles) and Bob Blumenfield (D-San Fernando Valley) have announced plans to introduce legislation in January that would prohibit California public entities from doing business with corporations that have contracts with Iran’s energy sector.
Nearly 40 years since the Reform movement ordained the first female rabbi in America, women rabbis have become an integral force in American Jewish movements outside Orthodoxy, and their experience, thought to be distinct from that of men, has become a topic of curiosity.
Video footage from "Women Rabbis: Trailblazers and Innovators"
When the Stone family opened up their Echo Park furniture store in the 1940s, most of the clientele was Jewish.
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