KA CC Archive April 2023

Shalom Kol Ami,

It is with mixed emotions that I write this last column as President of our Kehilla.  I will get to that a little later, but right now, I hope you all had a sweet Pesach and enjoyable seder(s) with family and friends.  Things at Kol Ami were very chill this past week with the usual Chag religious services and a successful congregational Seder, but there are many activities on the schedule and in the planning for the next few months to get us back to Kol Ami and bring us physically together.  The very successful Pizza and Pajamas Shabbat program continues, and several congregants will be touring together with Rabbi Blatt on a trip to Israel to celebrate the country’s 75^th Yom Ha’Atzmaut at the end of the month.  There will also be a new Executive Board and many new Board of Trustees members with a transfer of leadership occurring May 1st.

The past two years have been a very positive experience for me.  I have been able to meet most of our new members and countless members that have called Kol Ami their community for years.  I have gotten to know many of you much better.  During this term, we came through the pandemic safely and began to make Kol Ami our physical home again.  Our Covid Task Force, led by Dr. Steve Specter, slowly and with caution reduced restrictions to congregating, which allowed us to return to as near to the old normal as we could.  Best of all, there was not a single case of Covid 19 that was traced back to Kol Ami.  Two very socially and financially successful Gala fundraisers took place with the help of our staff and a cadre of congregants under the leadership of Larry Caine in Spring and Roberta Baer in December 2022. Our Membership numbers fell minimally during the early days of Covid, remained stable for a while, and are now slightly higher than they were when the pandemic began, thanks to Rabbi Blatt, Executive Director Mitch Weiss, and our Membership Chairs, Sharon Cross (2020-22 Board Year) and Carlos Romay (2022- 2024) along with their committees. We have begun to tackle the future with our current Recharge Goals of 1) membership retention, 2) attracting young families and children, and 3) welcoming interfaith families, with the help of our Staff and lay leaders Dan Ochman, Kevin Cross, and Cindy Korenvaes, respectively.  I would be remiss to not include all the efforts put forth by the Recharge Committee led by Dr. Steve Freedman in laying the foundation for this work.  I have been in contact and negotiations with Nachum Peterseil to have him continue as our High Holy Days Sh’liach Tzibor and create various programs with us outside of the High HolyDays over the next five years.   We are working with a group of congregants who have been members for 40-plus years and want to help continue the legacy of Kol Ami for at least 40 more years. 

Unfortunately, our Kol Yeladim population has been falling, but with the Recharge Committee, we are looking forward to more participation over the next few years.  We had to pass a deficit budget for the 2023-24 fiscal year, but there was a group of 10 families at the last Annual Congregational Meeting who pledged $1000 each to help reduce the shortfall.  The new leadership, with Kevin Cross at the helm, and our Finance Committee will work hard to bring us to a more positive financial place and lead us to a healthy future overall. 

I want to thank Bev Fink, Gary Teblum, David Pearlman, Denise Freedman, Carol Jaffe, and all the Past Presidents who listened to me, answered my questions, and gave sage advice.  Carol and Bev also acted as editors of several communications that went to the congregation from me and made sense of what I wrote.  I also must thank Jamie Krischer for putting up with my missed deadlines for this column and making them tell the story I wanted.  Thanks go to Jody Sampson-Nair for acting as the final proof reader of the column.  Writing this column is the one thing that I will not miss when my Presidency is behind me!  I am not a writer, but they helped to make it look good.  I also thank the Board of Trustees for all their help in leading the congregation, and I also deeply appreciate all of you who belong to our Congregation.

Last, but definitely not least, I want to thank Ethel for being there to support me in this endeavor, listening to my crazy ideas and complaints, being my sounding board, acting as my secretary on occasion, giving me good advice, and not giving up on me.  I love her and hope that everyone in the congregation has someone like her to help you through your lives.

I will finish with my usual tag line, that we will all be

B’Yachad

Kalman