Eldad Goldfarb

JCC receives $25M support

Minister and MP Harjit Sajjan speaks at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver on Dec. 5, while Jewish Federation chief executive officer Ezra Shanken looks on. (photo from Jewish Federation)

On Dec. 5, the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver (JCC) announced that it has received $25 million in support from the Government of Canada through the Department of Canadian Heritage. The funding will be used for the redevelopment of the 3.3-acre property at West 41st and Oak Street. It will support the transformation of the JCC into a state-of-the-art multigenerational community hub in the Oakridge area with more childcare spaces, expanded seniors programs, arts and cultural spaces, and an expanded Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre.

“The Government of Canada stands with Jewish communities across Canada and around the world. Today’s investment is part of our commitment to an inclusive Canada that is strong and proud of its diversity. Supporting cultural facilities is essential, not only to retain their viability today, but to help them flourish for generations to come,” said Minister of Canadian Heritage Pablo Rodriguez.

“The Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver is now another step closer to building a larger community hub where Vancouverites of all backgrounds can connect through shared experiences, while allowing the centre to continue providing services and supports that enrich quality of life in our city,” said Harjit Sajjan, minister of international development, minister responsible for the Pacific Economic Development Agency of Canada and member of Parliament (Vancouver South).

photo - Minister and MP Harjit Sajjan took some time out to meet some of the kids at the centre; MP Taleeb Noormohamed is standing to the minister’s right — Minister and MP Harjit Sajjan took some time out to meet some of the kids at the centre; MP Taleeb Noormohamed is standing to the minister’s right. *(photo from Jewish Federation)*

The redevelopment of the JCC is the cornerstone of the overall site redevelopment plan, which will also provide permanent homes for more than 20 not-for-profit community organizations and two residential towers that will provide mixed-use rental housing, some to be at below-market rates.

The JCC, Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver and King David High School have signed a memorandum of understanding that will see them work together to fulfil a shared vision rooted in extensive community and public consultation.

“The funding from the Government of Canada through the Department of Canadian Heritage contributes the resources necessary to support and sustain the Jewish community in Vancouver,” said Eldad Goldfarb, executive director of the JCC.

“The new space is poised to be a connection point that people of all ages and from all walks of life can enjoy for generations to come, and the legacy of this redevelopment will last a lifetime,” he added.

“This announcement is the result of efforts that spanned many years,” said Ezra Shanken, Jewish Federation chief executive officer. “We want to thank the Government of Canada and our advocacy agent, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, for their work on this.”

Monday’s announcement builds on the $25 million funding provided in 2021 by the B.C. government and a $25 million gift and community match from the Diamond Foundation.

– Courtesy Government of Canada and
Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver

JCC team welcomes Cristall

Alison Cristall is the new assistant executive director of the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. (photo from Alison Cristall)

Alison Cristall feels that she has come full circle, as she assumes her new job as assistant executive director of the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. Among her earliest recollections are times at the Davis YM-YWHA in Montreal: going to preschool, taking swimming lessons and attending summer camps.

“I used to wait for my mom to finish her aerobics class while I hung out at the café eating French fries and doughnuts. Needless to say, I have extremely fond memories of my childhood, and our JCC was a very big part of it. My hope is that I can be a part of creating memories for others that are foundational to their lives,” she said.

Cristall officially started at the JCC on Feb. 7 and, in a recent interview, she affirmed her excitement about the new role and shared some of her thoughts.

“My priority is to listen to the staff, the community, members and stakeholders,” she said. “We are at an interesting time. In this time of change, I think understanding where our community is at, where our funders and stakeholders are, and understanding what their priorities are, is going to be foundational to how I proceed with the team.”

Cristall will be taking over many of the same responsibilities as Debbie Tabenkin, the recently retired director of programming and strategic initiatives, though in a reprised assistant executive director’s position. The last person to hold that job was current JCC executive director Eldad Goldfarb.

Cristall arrives at 950 West 41st Avenue with a wealth of experience around recreation centres and helping people be physically active. The Montreal native moved to British Columbia to obtain a degree in human kinetics and pursue her passion of health promotion and recreation.

While at the University of British Columbia, she developed Active U, a student-led health promotion program designed to increase physical activity and healthy eating for students living on campus. Upon graduation, she started work immediately on ACTNowBC, an initiative run by the provincial government to encourage a healthy and active lifestyle.

After the 2010 Winter Olympics, Cristall held a position with SportMedBC, where she oversaw the Sun Run in Training Program and its sister program, Aboriginal RunWalk, a provincially funded initiative to bring health and wellness programming to 100 Indigenous communities in the province.

For the past six years, she has been the recreation supervisor of the Trout Lake Community Centre, a job that did not get any less hectic due to the pandemic, because a building with an ice rink still needed to be maintained and some operations, such as summer day camps, continued.

“I had the time of my life at the centre,” Cristall said. “It solidified for me that running a community centre is my true passion.”

She added, “I am completely motivated by creating a safe, vibrant and relevant space for people to feel connected. When the opportunity came up to take this position at the JCC, I knew it was the right choice to leave the Park Board.”

Cristall recognizes that these are unprecedented times, and she hopes to take part in the development of new programs as the JCC begins to restart activities.

“The way centres have traditionally operated will change. We need to move forward and provide services that people need and are ready to participate in,” she said, emphasizing that an understanding of where people are emotionally, psychologically and spiritually in the return to some semblance of normalcy is crucial.

She points out that with this transition come opportunities for the JCC to grow. For example, a switch to providing some hybrid activities could open up what the JCC has to offer to a broader group of people around the city and beyond.

“It’s a good time to do an evaluation of programs and services and conduct needs assessments around the community, and to think towards the future,” she said.

Cristall spoke in glowing terms regarding her connection to the Vancouver Jewish community, from the time she first met her husband at a Hanukkah party to the present.

“This is such a lovely Jewish community and you can really find the areas where you fit in,” she said. “It is a community that is integrated yet still very close, and they take care of each other in a very amazing way, and the JCC is at the centre of it. There is something so grounding about having a JCC that can be the home for programs and services or some need within the community.”

The JCC board and staff are equally excited to have Cristall join them.

“Alison is an accomplished and experienced professional,” said Goldfarb. “She will help set the course and lead our team as we continue serving our community as well as gearing up towards the creation and building of our new JCC and community hub…. I look forward to working with her, our dedicated team and board as we shape the future of our community.”

Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.

Debbie Tabenkin set to retire

Debbie Setton Tabenkin sees travel, genealogy and fun with grandkids in her future. (photo by Jocelyne Hallé)

Debbie Setton Tabenkin, one of the most familiar faces to anyone who has frequented the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver in the past three decades, is retiring at the end of January.

Tabenkin began teaching English as a second language at the JCC in 1995. In conjunction with that role, she was instrumental in creating the drop-in child-minding program for kids of parents using the centre’s facilities or attending programs. In the succeeding quarter-century, she has served in a variety of roles and retires as director of programming and strategic initiatives, where she oversees about 10 program areas and 12 budgets.

Tabenkin’s interesting family history plays a role in her approach to her work. Her parents’ lineage is from the Syrian and Turkish Jewish communities and, in the early part of the 20th century, parts of her family migrated to Jamaica and Panama. Because there was a polio pandemic in Jamaica when her mother was pregnant, they traveled to Panama, where Tabenkin (née Setton) was born, returning to Jamaica as a babe in arms.

“I was used to what the community centre meant in Latin America,” she said of her philosophy around the work she does. “It was a social place where you came and you met people.” The “living room” of the community, she calls it. That is what she believes she has helped foster in Vancouver.

But there was a winding road before she ended up here.

The Setton home in Jamaica was the holiday destination for any Jews who happened to be on the island, whether American Peace Corps volunteers or Israelis helping the nation with agricultural infrastructure.

When she was 16, the family left Jamaica, where violence was becoming frequent, and moved back to Panama.

Her grandfather owned the kosher supermarket in Panama City, where family members – she has about 100 first cousins – still operate it. The store moved into new digs that include a kosher sushi restaurant just two weeks ago.

She was the black sheep of the family, she cheerfully admits.

“I came from a very traditional family where the girls got married,” she said. “One [sister] got married at 19 and one got married at 17 – and I knew I wanted a different lifestyle.”

She did a two-year associate’s degree at the American college in the Canal Zone and then taught Grade 2. She wanted to further her education and her parents said she could either go to New York City, where a sister had moved, or to Vancouver, where her brother, Victor Setton, had settled in 1975.

She completed her bachelor of education at the University of British Columbia, but the federal government at the time did not have a program that allowed her brother to sponsor her to remain in the country. So, she returned to Panama and taught English at the Jewish day school, Instituto Alberto Einstein.

She decided to pursue a master’s degree and, in 1980, was accepted at both Columbia and New York University. She got her MA at Columbia in the then-new field of educational technology and media.

“I lived in New York for five years and, you know, everything is for a reason,” said Tabenkin. “I’m so happy the Canadian government didn’t take me because that gave me five years in New York and those five years made me the person I am.”

She drank in the cultural offerings of the city and became very involved with the Sephardi association there.

“I became very proud of being Sephardic,” she said. “I really learned the history of the rich culture that Sephardic Jews have. I took multiple classes. I accessed everything and that’s when I learned Hebrew.”

She returned again to Panama but, then aged 30, set her sights on a new conquest.

“I really wanted to have a child and I really wanted to get married,” she said. “I decided, OK, I’m going to go to Israel. My mother was delighted when I left to Israel.”

She had taken up scuba diving in Panama and poked her head into a scuba store in Tel Aviv looking for information about opportunities to pursue the sport. She chatted with a young man named Yair Tabenkin.

A few days later, a friend invited Debbie to tag along to a Purim party and a scuba expedition in Eilat being organized by a young man. When the friend described the pal who was planning the trip, Debbie replied, “I think I met him.”

When the mutual friend told Yair who she was bringing along, he said, “Oh, is that the girl with the beautiful blue eyes?”

“He remembered my eyes – and that was it,” she said. “The rest is history. We met that Purim and we got married in August.

“On the year anniversary that I had moved to Israel, I was married and pregnant,” she said. “Let’s put it this way: I accomplished my goal.”

Before that happened, there had been some snooping. Yair Tabenkin had some family in Panama and queried about the Setton family. A similar investigation was happening in reverse.

“My mother went to the rabbi and said, look, my daughter is dating this guy named Yair Tabenkin,” she said. “And the rabbi said ‘Tabenkin? It’s like marrying a Kennedy.’”

Yair’s grandfather, Yitzhak Tabenkin, was a founder of the kibbutz movement and a leading figure in the creation of Mapai, the precursor to the modern Labour Party, along with David Ben-Gurion and Berl Katznelson, and was a member of the first Knesset.

After Debbie and Yair married, they were speaking with Debbie’s brother in Vancouver, who said he had an opportunity for the new husband. The couple moved here in 1990.

Her responsibilities at the JCC expanded quickly from that first ESL gig. She began organizing events – something she had been doing since her teenage years, when she created a Purim party in Panama.

On New Year’s Eve 2003, Tabenkin organized a multi-generational event at the JCC, where kids were entertained by camp counselors in the gym and pool while parents dined and discoed before everyone came together at midnight.

In 2004, she began Festival Ha’Rikud, a celebration of Israeli culture through music, dance, food, art, workshops, literature, family activities and marketplace. This year saw the festival’s 18th iteration.

In 2008, she spearheaded the Israel at 60 festival in Stanley Park, one of the largest and most visible public celebrations in Jewish community memory.

As director of programming and strategic initiatives, she has a finger in pretty much every pie at the centre, but a particular point of pride is the inclusion department.

“Debbie’s had a very distinct impact on many people’s lives in the community,” said JCC executive director Eldad Goldfarb. “She’s a very caring person, both to her staff and team and to the members of the community, always trying to find what she likes to call the ‘magic moment,’ basically trying to find something good out of the bad and trying to solve problems and make people happy.”

Tabenkin holds a great deal of institutional memory not only of the JCC but of the entire community, Goldfarb added.

“She’s definitely someone whose big shoes are going to be difficult to fill,” he said. “She’s someone who’s got not just the history, but the personal connection to a lot of people in the community.”

In retirement, Tabenkin may do some consulting, spend more time with her three adult children and two grandchildren and she hopes to get back to some exotic adventures. Just before COVID, she returned from Ethiopia. Before that, she visited Uzbekistan. She wants to delve deeper into genealogy and would love to spend a month in Turkey investigating that branch of her family.

She looks back with more than fondness.

“I truly love this place,” she said. “My whole family has benefited so much. I always say a membership to the JCC buys you 15 extra years of your life. You’re keeping healthy, you’re working out, you’re with people, you’re not isolated. It’s truly a place where everyone can be together, it doesn’t matter what your socioeconomic background is, it doesn’t matter your religion. It’s a place where we all get to be together. It’s our living room.”

Historic JCC-Fed agreement

A rendering of the development that is planned to replace the current Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. (image from JCCGV)

A recently signed agreement is a significant next step in the largest infrastructure project in the history of British Columbia’s Jewish community. The deal is expected to create a new Jewish community centre, as well as at least 300 rental housing units and larger, renewed facilities for many communal institutions, replacing the existing, almost 60-year-old community centre.

A memorandum of understanding between the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver (JCC) and the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver was signed last month. The agreement will likely see the land owned by the JCC transferred to a new community-wide agency. According to a joint statement by the two organizations, the proposed new 200,000-square-foot “recreational, cultural and community centre [will include] new childcare spaces, more services for seniors, an expanded space for the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, a new theatre and more.” At least 15 not-for-profit community organizations are anticipated to be housed there, as well as updated and enlarged facilities for arts and culture, aquatics, and fitness programs. Mixed-use rental housing units included in the plan are expected to be offered at or below market value and be open to everyone.

The project will advance based on a collaborative fundraising initiative. A campaign goal has not been announced.

“This agreement is an important initial step toward acting upon the community’s vision for a revitalized JCC that would become a legacy for the Jewish community and the city,” Salomon Casseres, president of the JCC board, said in the statement. “Our board is excited to partner with Jewish Federation. We believe that this collaboration puts the project on a strong foundation for success, from a community, financial and governance perspective.”

“An opportunity like this comes along perhaps once in a generation, so we are very proud to be working closely with the JCC on this historic project,” Alex Cristall, Jewish Federation’s board chair, said in the statement. “Jewish Federation takes a broad, long-term view of the sustainability, growth and evolution of the local Jewish community, and we believe that this project will create a strong core that will ultimately allow us to increase our reach and our impact.”

Ezra Shanken, chief executive officer of the Jewish Federation, told the Independent that the collaboration is a “big win” for the community.

“Federation has always been a proponent for the concept of working together on projects that have an impact that’s beyond the reach of one agency and we are thrilled that the JCC agrees with us that this is one of those projects,” he said. “It absolutely should be common in all cities.… For me, it’s best practice.”

The new JCC will strengthen the entire community, he said, adding that the impacts will reach far beyond the Oakridge neighbourhood.

“We are not just creating a strong future for that 41st and Oak corridor, the Vancouver Jewish community, but I believe we’re creating a strong future for the community across the Lower Mainland as a whole,” Shanken said, expressing his gratitude to the JCC and its leadership.

“I think the JCC has shown immense foresight and courage in coming together with us, to have the openness to work through the challenges and opportunities that exist in partnership, and I believe that this partnership will glean really great results for the Jewish community as a whole,” he said.

Eldad Goldfarb, executive director of the JCC, said working together hand in hand is the best way forward and the partnership is a natural one. The collaboration between the JCC and Federation is the largest partnership, but is part of a broader engagement process, he added.

“The master planning process of this legacy community project has involved an extensive engagement effort by the JCC, reaching out and having conversations with more than 30 Jewish community organizations, many stakeholders, donors and community members,” said Goldfarb. “The JCC, as we know it today, is home to 15 different Jewish community organizations and the new redevelopment might increase these collaborations opportunities.”

Discussions about the partnership between the two organizations have always been very collaborative, open and in good faith, Goldfarb said.

“This project is about creating a JCC for the future of the community, with more and better childcare, seniors, wellness, arts, culture and education state-of-the-art spaces, but is not limited to only that,” he said. “Our vision is to create an innovative community site which will include a brand new J, as well as a welcoming and collaborative home for many other community organizations and, of course, the much-needed large rental affordable housing towers.”

Vancouver City Council unanimously approved the JCC site redevelopment plan in September 2018. Several major steps remain in the design and planning process, as well as the raising of the millions of dollars required to complete it.

Election views diverge

The Independent spoke with people in the Jewish community to gauge attitudes as the federal election approaches. What we found was a diversity of views and a lack of consensus.

An informal focus group of residents at the Weinberg Residence raised issues of out-of-pocket expenses for medical treatments and a lack of available doctors.

“You lose your doctor, you can’t get another one,” said one senior voter.

There was not great enthusiasm for any of the party leaders. One participant said she had lost respect for Liberal leader Justin Trudeau long before the recent brownface and blackface issue emerged.

“I was disappointed in him way back when he went to India and there was this whole thing of dressing up in Indian costumes. I felt it wasn’t very statesmanlike.”

“I feel that he’s had his chance and I don’t want to vote for him because he showed us what he can do. I don’t think he’s got what it takes,” said another voter.

“I expected nothing from Trudeau and I got it,” said another.

But there was no groundswell of support for Conservative leader Andrew Scheer.

“I’m disappointed,” said one. “I haven’t heard anything that’s promising.”

Some voters said NDP leader Jagmeet Singh comes across as sincere, but one said he has a lot of repair work to do with the Jewish community after his party’s positions against Israel in the past.

Elizabeth May, the Green leader, was viewed positively, but not seen as prime minister material.

“She’s very good at her subject, but I can’t envisage her really understanding what’s going on in the economy, in foreign affairs,” one resident said.

Among more than a dozen participants, the vast majority had a positive view of their incumbent MP, Jody Wilson-Raybould.

“I think she deserves better than she’s had,” said one person, while a Conservative supporter said she wishes Wilson-Raybould was running for her party, because she’d like to vote for her.

A show of hands indicated well more than half are undecided about who to vote for.

“Everybody’s confused,” said one, to laughter all around.

* * *

Alice Sundberg, director of operations and housing development for Tikva Housing Society, would like to see the federal government get back into funding nonprofit housing.

“We think that there is a really significant role for the federal government in making rental housing more affordable,” she said. Rather than subsidies to renters, which go into the pockets of landlords and don’t create new housing, she would like to see either capital grants to reduce mortgages for nonprofit or co-op housing, thus reducing the rental costs, or ongoing operating subsidies to organizations like hers that develop new housing.

“We don’t have enough supply,” said Sundberg. “Back in the ’90s, when the federal government withdrew from funding new affordable housing, it was really the beginning of our homelessness crisis.”

Housing is also a topic for Eldad Goldfarb, executive director of the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. The centre’s redevelopment will include at least 300 units of affordable rental housing. His team has spoken to many federal officials, including MPs, but, so far, he said, “No commitments, no confirmations, lots of good feedback and great understanding of the project, support for it, but nothing has translated into actual commitments, funding, promises, nothing of that sort.”

Support for the housing component might include financing from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, rather than grants, though he hopes for federal cash for the new JCC building. He credited the federal government for stepping up with funding for security infrastructure for communities at risk, but added there is always need for more.

* * *

The rise of hate-motivated rhetoric and violence leads some community leaders to call for more federal action and leadership.

“With the rise of antisemitism, racism and far-right extremism, particularly in the online space, the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre would welcome a comprehensive strategy to tackle hate in all its forms,” said Nina Krieger, executive director of the VHEC.

Russ Klein, principal of King David High School, would like to hear party leaders and candidates address how they are demonstrating moral and ethical leadership that creates trust and inspires Canadians, especially young people.

“How will they work to ease a society which seems quick to feel fear and seems overly stressed and anxious?” asked Klein. “I want to know how they will support a kinder, more inclusive society that offers hope and opportunity for all but especially to young people and to the most vulnerable in our society. How will they work to maintain affordable housing, livable wages and allow people to manage a balanced lifestyle in cities like Vancouver, where young families cannot afford to live in their current community? We live in extremely concerning times globally and I want Canada to lead in decreasing world tensions – how will they do that?”

* * *

Similar broad topics arose among a handful of University of British Columbia students who met at Hillel House to discuss issues that are important to them. All agreed that there has not been enough discussion of foreign affairs and there is a lack of substantive difference between the parties on issues like immigration.

“I don’t see any candidate that has a clear foreign policy vision, even though I think Chrystia Freeland is, personally, a great minister of foreign affairs,” said Adam Yosef Dobrer, a third-year political science student who is volunteering on Zach Segal’s Conservative campaign in Vancouver Granville.

Dobrer also wants Canada to return to the Conservative policy of defunding the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), which he called the greatest obstacle to peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

“In the last four years, I found it very difficult to understand where Canada as a nation lies in foreign affairs,” said Nika Perel, a fourth-year psychology student from Ontario who plans to vote Conservative. She credited the previous Conservative government with more clarity on Israel and Palestine and on Russia and Ukraine. “Stephen Harper made it very clear that he took a position supporting Ukraine.”

Jake Reznik, a nursing student with an undergraduate degree in kinesiology who remains an undecided voter, said Canada is not adequately standing up to China over its treatment of the Muslim-minority Uygher population or its other human rights violations. He added: “There is a lot of influence that the Chinese government does have in Canada that goes under-recognized.”

Matt Perzow, an NDP supporter who plans to vote strategically for Joyce Murray, the Liberal candidate in Vancouver Quadra, to prevent a Conservative government, emphasized health care, including mental health services. Defending Canadian values like multiculturalism and care for the most vulnerable are also things he wants to see party leaders prioritize.

All the students agreed that supporting Israel is an important consideration in their vote, but also said it will not be the deciding factor.

“I wouldn’t vote for any party that I thought would jeopardize the future of the Jewish people, whether it’s in Canada, in Israel or in another place,” said Perzow. “I’m not voting for somebody because of that issue, but, if I thought that something compromised the well-being of the Jewish people, I wouldn’t support them.”

Dobrer, whose family migrated to Canada from Israel when he was an infant because of the Second Intifada, said he has a “very resonant emotional connection” to Israel “but I am a Canadian first.” He is concerned about some election candidates, including Green party MP Paul Manly, who Dobrer says has a “long and sordid history of antisemitism and 9/11 ‘trutherism’ and delving into conspiracy theories.” (After being elected in a by-election this year, Manly denied he supports 9/11 conspiracies after the CBC reported on statements he had made in 2007 and 2011.)

The students all agreed that the environment and climate change are top issues for them and their peers, but expressed nearly universal hopelessness that anything substantive would change.

“I have no doubt that it will not be addressed,” said Reznik. “I know personally I’m not going to be willing to sacrifice my own standard of living and, at the same time, I think it is tremendously insulting on my part to tell someone else that they can’t attain my standard of living that we have here.”

“A lot of people are standing up and screaming about things, but they’re not going to do anything about it,” said Perel.

A hint of hope came from Dobrer: “From the government, I’m very skeptical. But from young intellectual minds, from the not-for-profit sector, from the private sector, every day there is more and more innovation, technological advances and more intellectual capital devoted to dealing with climate change.”

B.C. helps JCC re-do

Left to right: The Hon. Selina Robinson, B.C. minister of municipal affairs and housing; Michelle Pollock, past president of the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver; and Eldad Goldfarb, JCCGV executive director. (photo from JCCGV)

Selina Robinson, British Columbia’s minister of municipal affairs and housing, visited the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver last month to make an announcement regarding the centre’s planned redevelopment.

On June 13, Robinson announced a provincial contribution to support the planning phase of the redevelopment, which intends to replace the existing JCC with a new facility where the existing parking lot is located, as well as a multi-use tower to be located on the site of the existing JCC, most of which will be housing. (For details of the plan, see jewishindependent.ca/jcc-site-to-be-redeveloped.)

“The B.C. government is committed to increasing the affordability and availability of housing in B.C. and we welcome opportunities, like the community centre-led project, that can support these goals,” the ministry of municipal affairs and housing said in a statement to the Independent. “A total of $200,000 has been provided to the Jewish Community Centre to support further development of the housing component of their plan. This plan has the potential to serve people at all ages and stages of life with housing, a new community gathering place, and services for seniors, children and their parents.”

Eldad Goldfarb, executive director of the JCCGV, said the province’s support for this component of the process is an important recognition of the value of the project for the community.

“It’s a very helpful contribution toward the planning process. It’s not money that will be used toward bricks and mortar because, at this point, we’re doing the planning, the rezoning, the budgeting and all these parts that are comprised of planning,” he said. “It’s an initial infusion of support, an investment by the province, to help us move the planning along towards getting this project started and completed.”

The redevelopment dovetails with a number of the provincial government’s priorities, including affordable rental housing, the creation of new childcare spaces, supports for seniors and cultural spaces.

Goldfarb said the community centre is keeping federal, provincial and civic officials closely informed about the project’s progress.

The City of Vancouver is expected to convene a public hearing on the proposed redevelopment this fall.

“We’re excited to see the B.C. government provide planning funds for the JCC redevelopment,” said Karen James, board chair of the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver, in a statement to the Independent. “This will be a transformational project for our community and the Oakridge area.”

*** This article has been edited to reflect that the redevelopment will no longer include a new home for the Louis Brier Home and Hospital. ***

B.C. premier tours JCC

B.C. Premier John Horgan toured the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver on March 29, speaking with community members of all ages. (photo from Office of the Premier)

B.C. Premier John Horgan visited the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver just before erev Pesach, March 29.

The premier had visited the JCCGV before, but only to attend meetings in the boardroom, and this was his first visit as the province’s head of government.

photo - Horgan toured the building, visited the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, the sports facilities and spent time with children and parents at the daycare — Horgan toured the building, visited the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, the sports facilities and spent time with children and parents at the daycare. *(photo from Office of the Premier)*

Horgan toured the building, visited the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, the sports facilities and spent time with children and parents at the daycare.

In a statement to the Independent after the meeting, the premier said: “People drive community. Touring the centre really hit that message home.… I was glad to meet with and hear from community leaders, see the range of services being provided and visit with kids, parents and educators at the childcare centre in advance of Passover.”

On April 12, the premier also participated in a Yom Hashoah ceremony at the B.C. Legislature, which included numerous survivors of the Holocaust. In next week’s Independent, there will be more about the Yom Hashoah commemorations that took place in Victoria and Vancouver.

“Our goal was for him to get to know us and get to see our centre, get to understand the level and breadth of activities we offer,” said Eldad Goldfarb, executive director of the JCCGV. “His focus was primarily on childcare and I think he had a few more visits during that day to other [childcare] facilities.… We wanted him to see what we are doing and we wanted him to hear about our plans for the future.”

While there was no formal agenda for the meeting, after the tour, Horgan met with representatives of agencies that are located in the building. He was introduced and thanked by Alvin Wasserman, vice-president of the JCCGV.

While affordable housing was not on the agenda officially, Goldfarb said he discussed with the premier the opportunity for including such accommodations within the planned redevelopment of the JCCGV site. The new provincial government made a substantial commitment to affordable housing in its first budget, Feb. 27.

Nico Slobinsky, director of the Pacific Region for the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, said Horgan was at the centre more to listen than to talk.

“He was there to learn a little bit about what the centre does and the opportunity to connect with the community since becoming premier,” said Slobinsky, who helped arrange the visit. “He hasn’t had a chance yet to do that. He did that before but not since becoming premier.

“As a community,” he said, “we have long enjoyed a great relationship with the provincial government and we are very happy to see that continue.”