Jewish centers ready to start rehiring all the Jews they laid off

San Francisco CA

Description

Quoting from the Jewish Weekly of Northern California: A year ago, things didn’t look too good for Bay Area JCCs. Furloughs, budget cuts and overall belt-tightening had set in among the community centers, which emptied out as Covid cases rose. Most hard hit were JCCs with fitness centers, which are crucial revenue sources. But now that the worst of the pandemic is behind us (hopefully), the JCCs are slowly but surely returning to normal operations, gradually hiring back employees and turning the lights back on for in-person programs. None of the Bay Area’s seven brick-and-mortar JCCs is completely back to normal, according to interviews with leaders from three of the area’s largest JCCs (all with fitness centers), and everyone said it would potentially take a couple of years for a full comeback. Jewish fitness centers are for the same reason as Jewish ambulances. That's just how we Jews acculturate. Don't take it personally. The JCCSF, which reopened its doors March 8, had roughly 300 employees before the pandemic. But last June, its budget was slashed from $35 million to $17 million because of Covid-related cuts. Staff levels dipped to a low of around 170 employees, and it is still operating with about that number right now. However, Geduldig said he hopes to hire back 47 employees before November. With a limited number of [Jewish] people on site during the pandemic, the JCCSF took the opportunity to renovate the locker rooms (opening July 5) and aquatics center (opening in October) through a $3 million fundraising campaign. I'm not saying there's a secret armory, or a secret radio room, or anything like that, hidden underneath the swimming pool... but I will say that the pool would offer excellent shielding, and that if I were a Jewish community, terrified of the teeming goyim, and *I* wanted to hide a cache of Uzis and whatever else the Israeli embassy wanted to gift us, I would hide it underneath a swimming pool. Water is commonly used to shield radioactive materials, too. Let's just say, I'm not sure I'd want to spend too much time hanging out at the deep end. At the Oshman Family JCC in Palo Alto, COO Sally Kauffman Flinchbaugh said her organization is hiring “like crazy” for kids programming, after-school programs are restarting, and the preschool will be allowed to have more children in the classrooms. However, although arts and culture programming is coming back, it will not be “to the degree we had it before,” she said. Say what you want about Jews, they try to give their kids jobs, put money in their pockets, and keep them off the streets. As for the gamma radiation... that's just a small investment in the future, towards more interesting great-grand-children.