Local Briefs: JCC Names Young Leader, Boxt Bound for Israel
JCC Names Young Leader
Marcus Jewish Community Center board member Josh Rosenberg has been named the first winner of the Steven and Janet Cadranel Biennial Young Leadership Award, which will pay for Rosenberg to attend the JCC Association of North America biennial in Baltimore in May.
The award celebrates emerging leaders at the Marcus JCC and honors the Cadranels and their children, plus the Asher, Morris and Max Benator families and the Albert Tenenbaum family.
“I am extremely grateful for the selfless leaders and mentors I have benefited from in my life,” said Steven Cadranel, the president of Arris Realty Partners and a past president of the Marcus JCC. He said he and his wife “can think of no more deserving recipient for its inaugural grant than Josh. His leadership and commitment to the MJCCA and our community will be felt for generations to come.”
Rosenberg, a principal with Bessemer Trust, said he was honored to receive the award. “I look forward to attending the biennial and using the knowledge I gain there to enhance our JCC. Being a board member of the MJCCA is a privilege for me and a responsibility I take very seriously. I commend Steven and Janet for their visionary gift and for investing in the future leadership of the MJCCA.”
Rosenberg is co-chair of the Marcus JCC’s Erwin Zaban Leadership Development Program.
In addition to attending the biennial, Rosenberg will be a part of the JCC Association’s Esther Leah Ritz Emerging JCC Leaders Institute.
“This institute was designed to help future leaders in the Jewish communal world,” Rosenberg said. “I look forward to meeting with other JCC leadership and bringing back some of their successes to our community: how to help our JCC to continue to achieve excellence and how to have our JCC continue to make an impact in our community.”
Boxt Bound for Israel
Temple Kol Emeth Rabbi Erin Boxt will join more than 300 Reform rabbis from around the world at the 127th annual convention of the Central Conference of American Rabbis from Feb. 23 to 28 in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
Rabbi Boxt and other CCAR members will meet with Knesset members and Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, as well as other Israeli thinkers, activists, politicians and leaders. Rabbis also will travel to the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, where they will participate in a mini-conference on national Israeli policies.
“It’s important for Reform rabbis to have a presence in Israel, to show that we are committed to an Israel that is based on our shared the values of democracy, pluralism, peace and inclusivity,” Rabbi Boxt said. “This valuable, on-the-ground experience in Israel, including with Israeli leaders, will enable me to share the insights I gained with my community and deepen our ongoing relationship with Israel.”
Some rabbis will participate in the Tel Aviv Marathon to raise money for Reform Judaism in Israel. Some will take part in a tolerance march in Jerusalem in support of the LGBT community in Israel.
Samuel’s Next Big Case
When the AJT last reported on lawyer Don Samuel, the Congregation Shearith Israel member was speaking in December about the legal status of our privacy rights, but he is best known for taking on such high-profile criminal cases as the murder trial of Baltimore Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis.
Expect to see a lot of Samuel in the coming months with his latest client: DeKalb County police Officer Robert Olsen, who was indicted Thursday, Jan. 21, on murder charges for fatally shooting naked, unarmed Air Force veteran Anthony Hill in Chamblee in March 2015.
Olens Georgian of Year
Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens, the highest-ranking Jewish official elected statewide in Georgia history, was named Georgia Trend magazine’s 2016 Georgian of the Year for his collaborative efforts leading the state’s legal affairs for the good of the state’s citizens.
Among the issues cited by the magazine are improvements to the state’s law on open government records and meetings, a campaign about the dangers of prescription drugs, and work with, among others, state Sen. Renee Unterman to toughen the prosecution of sex traffickers.
The magazine also named Atlanta Falcons owner Arthur Blank to its Most Influential Hall of Fame, where he joins Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus, a longtime member of Georgia Trend’s Hall of Fame.
Athens Fest Next
The Atlanta Jewish Film Festival has just begun, but it’s not too soon to make plans for the next film festival on the calendar, the Athens Jewish Film Festival.
The ninth annual festival will be held from March 19 to 22.
Opening night will be at the Georgia Museum of Art with a gala and screening of “Dough,” in which Jonathan Pryce plays a kosher baker whose profits rise in smoke.
The rest of the festival will be held at Ciné Bar Cafe Cinema, concluding with the documentary “Deli Man.” Other films on the schedule include “Zemene,” “Above and Beyond,” “A Borrowed Identity,” “Chagall-Malevich,” “Apples From the Desert,” “The Last Mentsch” and “Victor Young Perez.”
Details and tickets are available at athensjff.org.
comments