Bet Torah Blog

As we close out this last edition of the Message for the year, I want to acknowledge and thank the leadership and volunteers engaged in our Social Action Portfolio. They are the true heroes of social action who bring their passion and commitment to our projects, initiatives, and mission. Coming on as the Board Representative for this team I inherited from Jen Sokol a group of individuals who have a clear focus on their goals, and the way to achieve them. They have put together a seasoned group of individuals while welcoming newcomers from our community with open arms. I had the privilege over the last two years of overseeing and working beside them and then the pleasure of reporting back to the board on their plans and accomplishments.

In addition to the leaders directly on the social action committee, I was privileged to be able to draw together the Social Action leaders from other prongs of the synagogue and work with Emily Mudge and Sa- rah Wien from the Nursery School, Laurie Steinmetz and Beverly Busman from Sisterhood, and Anila Gordon from Kulanu. What a joy for all of us to combine our efforts in unified synagogue endeavors.

At the Gala, we celebrated the Caring Committee and its outstanding work for our own Bet Torah community. Thank you to Nancy Fried-Tanzer, Erin Davis Kuflik, and Paul Rosenfeld for continually working to make sure that all our congregants are showered with Chesed. Thank you to Sandy Kellogg for continuing her work creating a dialogue with our interfaith group, and for renewing our connection to the women’s prisons this year. Thank you to Michele Posner for her continual programming to engage us at Bet Torah with meaningful ways to perform Mitzvahs in our community. Thank you to the Social Justice team led by Elaine Gloth- Merker who continually assure that we perform Tzedekah. Under her leadership, Linda Dishner led our Im- migration Initiative with this year's undertaking of resettlement of refugees and the formation of a community coalition, ReSET WESTCHESTER. Thank you to Liz Schonfeld for her leadership of our racial justice initiative and our newly formed Ukraine initiative group.

Liz will be stepping into my shoes as Social Action Chair this July, and I am confident that she will bring her competent brand of know-how and leadership to the role.

Thank you to our Bet Torah Board, which under Amy Horowitz’s leadership, along with our clergy, led me on this two-year journey and held my hand, constantly reinforced the importance of our Social Action work as a synagogue, and provided the support to make our efforts a reality.