A Chanukah Message from Terri Bonoff

Jewish Family & Career Services recently convened a community conversation featuring two distinguished Israeli guests from JDC Eshel. Yossi Heyman and Marc Codron shared their breakthrough innovative work on aging with leaders from the community. Their vision is to create communities that support seniors living with joy and dignity to age 100. They have established a public-private partnership with the municipalities in Israel to implement a data-driven best practices approach called Muni 100.

We brought together elected officials from the cities of Atlanta, Sandy Springs, and Dunwoody, as well as officials from the Atlanta Regional Commission and the Israeli Consulate. This gathering inspired leaders to engage in meaningful conversation about how the learnings and expertise shared by our Israeli guests could enrich the quality of life for seniors in our community. We, as Jews, guided by Jewish values, are called to use the gifts we have been given to improve the lives of those around us. As antisemitism rages, it is more important than ever that we courageously and publicly link arms and step forward as community leaders to share wisdom, empathy, and a profound commitment to positively impact the quality of life for all.

This year, we adopted a new Strategic Plan with Jewish values as the guiding light. Compassion, (rachamim) acts of healing, repair the world, (tikkun olam), kindness, (g’milut chasadim) collaboration, (kehillah) and the uniqueness of every human, (adam yaheed) are values reflected in our mission, and, more importantly, in the actions we take to empower lives and strengthen our community.

Convening the conversation on aging is directly connected to these core values of JF&CS as is our work addressing mental health and well-being with a spotlight on children, teens and families, providing services for the intellectual and developmental disabilities community, operating the only free dental clinic in Georgia thanks to incredible volunteer staff and generous donors, and responding with compassion to emergencies such as supporting refugees from Ukraine. I feel an incredible sense of strong Jewish pride and gratitude for our Atlanta community that continues to shine bold and bright.

Terri Bonoff is the CEO of Jewish Family & Career Services.