NEWSLETTER CONTENTS
Chronicles SPRING 2015
Letter from the President ........................................... 1 Harold Colton-Max to be Honored in June ................. 1 Letter from the CEO ................................................... 2 The Men’s Club at Village Apartments........................ 2 Harold Colton-Max Endowment Fund......................... 2 Sharon Saltzman Retires as CFO ................................. 2 Check Out Our New Promenade! ............................... 3 Plaza Volunteers are our Resident Book Worms! ........ 3 New Generator Installed at Village Apartments ......... 3 Respite Stays at Lester Senior Housing ...................... 4 Lester Senior Housing Hosts Medicaid Seminar.......... 4 Residents of B’nai B’rith Attend Senior Prom ............. 5 Colton-Maxes Honored as Stars of Essex.................... 5 JCHC University’s spring semester is in full swing ...... 5 Four Endowment Funds .............................................. 6 Help Us Raise Funds by shopping on Amazon.com! ... 6 JCHC Tributes ............................................................. 6
JEWISH COMMUNITY HOUSING CORPORATION OF METROPOLITAN NEW JERSEY 760 Northfield Ave., West Orange, NJ 07052 | 973-731-2020 | www.jchcorp.org
LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT I have learned so much in the past year as President of the JCHC, and have much more to learn. Learning is the second best thing about this role; the very best thing are the people that I have met. The board members are bright and dedicated volunteers who understand that we can make a difference. Our staff members are all dedicated to making our facilities, services and programs special for each of our residents. Above all else are our special residents who deserve our caring, time and ingenuity. As a lawyer I have seen and served varying needs and expectations of different clients, many of whom treat the legal work they seek as a commodity they are purchasing, like office supplies. However, I have never distinguished the scope of service or attention I give to any client, regardless of their distinct concerns. The medical world has seen a similar consolidation and commoditizing, where hospitals or large medical groups are buying up smaller practices. We gave up house calls generations ago. Increasingly, a visit to a doctor’s office is like a bakery. Take a number and wait your turn. Like most businesses, the business of providing housing and services to seniors is going through a similar change in our country. Large national chains are building increasingly larger facilities, holding more and more residents and providing more varied services. The size of these organizations allows them to experiment and innovate so that they can offer more services, each intended to boost profits. These large organizations also have the resources to create a look that differentiates their facilities from the competition, which they also hope will pay shareholder dividends. These chains are challenged to control costs while trying to individualize services, reporting to centralized management often located hundreds of miles away, and to which each resident represents a profit unit. Their senior living communities are a commodity instead of a service. Unlike these national chains, the JCHC is a local nonprofit. We service a discrete population within a geographically narrow region. Unlike the larger for-profits, we have tailored our services for our constituents and are mindful of who we serve. Each resident is a name, a member of a family that has roots in our community, a person who has chosen us because of what we stand for, and not what we look like. Of course, we need to have state-of-the-art facilities that are attractive and make our residents proud to call it their home, but there are other critical concerns we keep top of mind. We must address the increasingly diverse need of our residents for services, so that when they require different care we can provide it for them. We need to be able to provide care and services in a homelike, non-institutional setting that respects the dignity of each of our residents. Above all, we do not commoditize our residences; rather, we value the immense personal and organization-wide satisfaction that we are giving our time, care and attention to our residents who gave the same to building our communities. In so doing, we continue to fulfill the Fifth Commandment: In honoring our elders, we bring honor to ourselves. That is our goal. It is not to be the largest nor necessarily provide the most, but to provide the best within our ability. I thought we were doing this when I first accepted the nomination as President. I now since learned that we do this every day.
Alan Cohen President, Board of Trustees
Harold Colton-Max to be Honored in June for his 10th Anniversary as our CEO We can’t believe it’s been ten years already since Harold Colton-Max took the reins as the Chief Executive Officer of the Jewish Community Housing Corporation. His accomplishments on behalf of our organization and our residents are enormous and will resonate for decades to come. Therefore, we are delighted to honor him on the 10th anniversary of his tenure as the JCHC’s CEO, at our Annual Meeting on June 15 at the Crystal Plaza in Livingston. Here is a partial list of Harold’s many accomplishments over the years (too numerous to list them all!): • Full occupancy for the first time ever at the Weston Assisted Living Residence. • Jewish Federation Plaza and the South Orange B’nai B’rith Federation House named as Communities of Quality by the National Affordable Housing Management Association. • Refinancing of the South Orange B’nai B’rith Federation House, Village Apartments of the Jewish Federation and Jewish Federation Plaza; this led to major capital improvements to the buildings, hundreds of thousands of dollars in annual interest savings each, boosted emergency reserves, and more money allocated to resident programming and other services. • Secured a PSE&G grant to make energy efficiency upgrades throughout Jewish Federation Plaza reducing utility usage and expense. • Sale of Jewish Federation Towers to set aside funds for future development and other programming, while maintaining the affordable housing requirements for at least another 20 years (10 more than was required under our agreement with HUD). • Enhancement of resident safety by securing funding from the Healthcare Foundation of New Jersey to upgrade the emergency response system in all apartment buildings. • Implementation of JCHC University to provide regularly scheduled, intellectually challenging resident programming. • Opening of dental office, physical therapy suite and rabbi’s office at the Lester Senior Housing Community. • Hiring of first recreational coordinators for Essex County buildings to increase social, intellectual and physical opportunities for our seniors. In addition to his work at the JCHC, Harold has served as the President of the Affordable Housing Professionals of New Jersey since January 1, 2013 (he previously served as Board Secretary and Treasurer). He has also represented the JCHC in national, state and local coalitions, including LeadingAge, the Housing and Community Development Network of New Jersey, MetroWest CARES and the South Orange Senior Citizen Advisory Committee. On April 29, he and his wife Nomi were honored at Essex County’s Annual Jewish Heritage Celebration with the Star of Essex Award by Essex County in recognition of their leadership, dedication to public service, and their commitment to improving the lives of Essex County residents. Mazel tov and yasher koach!