by dan pine
staff writer
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Every year the bills come in like a meteor shower, and when they do Aylon Engler swallows hard before opening the envelopes.
Here’s why:
Those High Holy Day seats better be comfortable. Engler’s annual synagogue dues at Peninsula Sinai Congregation in Foster City total $2,500.
Yearly tuition and fees at Foster City’s Ronald C. Wornick Jewish Day School for two of Engler’s three children: $30,000.
Friendship Circle Hebrew School tuition for a third child: $1,500.
Donations to the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation and other Jewish organizations: $500 or more.
And look out — Engler’s son Jacob just had his bar mitzvah, one of the priciest simchas in the Jewish life cycle. Put Engler down for at least another $15,000.
Ka-ching! That’s the sound of money flowing out of Engler’s bank account and into the Jewish community. This year alone, his tab totals around $50,000. Though Engler and his wife, Barbara, both make good salaries (he owns a software company, VOConline; she’s an attorney), the San Mateo couple will definitely feel the pinch.
“Being Jewish in general is not cheap,” says Engler. “Our income is above average for the Bay Area, but we’re in that special class where we feel it but we don’t get the breaks.”
Affording a Jewish life, which may include membership in a synagogue or a JCC, enrolling children in a Jewish day school or summer camp, can drive some people out of the market.
“The Costs of Jewish Living,” a 2002 study funded by the American Jewish Committee, crunched the numbers and found that the typical family could be out $30,000 to $35,000 a year for Jewish affiliations. And that was five years ago. The report concluded, “Jewish life costs too much for all but the highly motivated.”
From brit to burial, Jewish life can put a major dent in the family budget. However, before terminal sticker shock sets in, some local Jewish professionals have been trying to get out the message: Most institutions work overtime to make their services affordable to all.
For many, affiliation begins at the synagogue door. Though any Jew is welcome to attend Shabbat services or minyan, joining a synagogue usually requires a serious investment. Nationally, annual dues average $1,100.
However, families for whom dues present a financial hardship do have options. Gone are the days when temple administrators required tax returns to verify need. Nowadays, some synagogues attempt creative approaches to make membership affordable.
At San Francisco’s Congregation Emanu-El, for example, suggested annual family dues total $1,800. But administrators believe they’ve come up with an offer no prospective member could refuse: Dues are voluntary — at least for the first few years.
“We call it ‘membership commitments,’” says Emanu-El’s executive director, Gary Cohn. “It’s working beautifully. If someone calls and we say the first-year dues are voluntary and we want to make sure you make the right commitment, it changes the conversation.”
So far the voluntary dues system has been a boon to Emanu-El’s bottom line. Membership has grown to more than 2,500 family units, up from 1,600 about 10 years ago.
“No matter what dues-collection system synagogues use,” adds Cohn, “a third [of membership will pay] at target, a third above and a third below. That’s historic data.
“What we said was, ‘Let’s focus on the top third and try to get them to contribute higher levels.’ Critics said if it’s voluntary, people will immediately reduce. If you offer a good product, a member is not immediately going to move dues down.”
Karen Bluestone serves as planning director for the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation. She thinks highly of the Emanu-El dues structure but concedes it may not work at all synagogues.
“Emanu-El can do it because they have endowments, a fantastic structure, a fantastic building and resources,” she says. “They’re not living hand-to-mouth. They took a huge risk and it’s paid off for them because they deliver. There have been periods of my life I haven’t been able to pay dues, and I know how hard it is for families to pay.”
A synagogue may be a primary entry point to Jewish life, but having children is perhaps the most common trigger for embarking on that life. At every stage of child development, the Jewish community offers corresponding educational environments, from Mommy and Me classes to accredited high schools. For many families, the school becomes the central Jewish address.
But do soaring costs put a Jewish education out of reach for all but the wealthiest families? Many professionals say, “Not if we can help it.”
Barbara Chotiner, director of early childhood services at the Contra Costa Jewish Community Center, wants to bring young families into the Jewish fold. Her program admits children as young as six-weeks through kindergarten. Annual costs vary depending on the child’s age and the number of days attending, ranging from $4,400 for two days a week up to $12,000 for extended care five days a week.
“Scholarships are available,” says Chotiner, “based on income and need. We give as much as we can. It’s incorporated in the center’s budget. We’re not turning anybody away. We truly feel every child should have a basic Jewish education and preschool experience.”
Parents at the JCC also are required to put in 15 hours of volunteer time per year, and must pay a $100 volunteer fee. Once they do their hours, they get the money back, though many end up donating the fee to the school.
Lisa Pavlovsky and Jay Schulman of Lucas Valley send their two preschool-age sons to the Osher Marin Jewish Community Center’s early childhood center. They had to join the JCC first, and were then eligible for tuition reduction at the school.
“It’s a huge expense for us,” says Pavlovsky. “In reality we can’t afford it, but we didn’t look anywhere else. The educational philosophy is in line with our philosophy. We do get aid and we couldn’t do it without it.”
For Pavlovsky, who grew up attending Congregation Rodef Sholom in San Rafael, the JCC’s school (which shares the same campus) has been an important gateway to Jewish life.
“It’s had a huge impact on our family,” she says. “Friday nights we do the candles, the wine and the challah. It’s so important for kids to have ritual and feel they belong to something higher than themselves instead of this materialistic culture they grow up in.”
What happens when the kids reach elementary school age? Pavlovsky and her husband would like to consider sending their children to a Jewish day school, but they know their expenses will skyrocket if they do.
Tuition at their closest Jewish day school, Brandeis Hillel, would set them back $19,550 per child per year.
Mervyn Danker, head of school at the Ronald C. Wornick Jewish Day School in Foster City, readily acknowledges that affording a Jewish education is “an uphill challenge for many families.”
Says Danker: “I’ve done the arithmetic — $150,000 a year sounds like a decent living, but when you take off taxes and mortgage payments, put food on the table, and add in day to day living expenses, you’d be hard-pressed to find $30,000. For a family earning that, the Jewish day school prices itself out of the market, unless they qualify for assistance.”
Those who cannot afford full tuition –– which runs around $14,000 per year at Wornick –– may apply for a tuition discount by submitting detailed financial information. Applications go to an independent-review organization, which analyzes the data and calculates a tuition fee. That figure is further adjusted for the higher cost of living in the Bay Area.
Currently, 25 percent of Wornick families receive tuition relief.
“We try hard to work with parents and come up with a figure the school feels is fair,” adds Danker. “Even then they make sacrifices to pay that amount.”
Danker’s school offsets some of its scholarship costs via a fund established by the JCF’s Jewish Community Endowment Fund. The fund subsidizes Jewish day schools offering tuition breaks.
When school lets out in June, parents want to send their kids to Jewish summer camps. Many say the camp experience, perhaps more than anything else, helps solidify Jewish identity in Jewish youth.
But with fees that climb as high as $1,000 a week, that’s one high-priced identity.
“There’s an acknowledgement that Jewish camping is expensive,” says Ruben Arquilevich, executive director of Camp Newman, a Reform movement camp in Santa Rosa. “Given that, leaders in the Jewish community understand the value of camping, and there’s an absolute commitment from every camp to make sure financial obstacles are not the obstacle.”
Arquilevich says camps like his offer sibling discounts, financial aid packages, interest-free loan payment plans and the like. Locally, the Bureau of Jewish Education and the Jewish Community Federations (both in San Francisco and the East Bay) sponsor camperships, helping dozens of children every summer. Individual philanthropists and endowment funds have also been more supportive of camps in recent years.
There’s a good reason for this, says Arquilevich.
“This is where kids experience their first steps in being independent,” he says. “Giving our children two or three weeks at a Jewish camp for at least five to 10 years of youth is one of the greatest gifts we can give children. Where else can kids be so joyful about Judaism?”
Actually, there may be one other place: Israel. For many parents, sending their kids to Israel is a key to cementing Jewish identity. That 10,000-mile journey may begin with a single step. But for many, it also begins with plenty of room on the MasterCard.
Or does it?
Taglit-Birthright Israel, which sends Jewish young adults up to age 26 on a free 10-day trip to Israel, is one of the most successful programs in the Jewish world. The catch is that it has to be a first-time trip, and there is a waiting list. But with philanthropists like Sheldon Adelson recently pumping $25 million into Birthright, that waiting list is shorter than before.
To make visiting Israel a family affair, experts say there are ways to get there without breaking the bank. Daniela Aharoni, Israel’s consul for tourism in the western United States, says smart shopping can save money.
“I suggest people not go in [high-traffic] seasons,” she says, “which is High Holy Days, Passover and during December. All the rest of the year is left. Since the weather is nice all year, you can travel January to May.”
She recommends goisrael.com as a good starting point for hotel and airfare shopping. Deals can be had, with airline ticket prices ranging wildly from day to day. She recommends staying at a kibbutz as another way to save on accommodations. But whatever is spent on tourism, she says, goes a long way to help Israel.
“Every 100,000 tourists creates 4,000 new jobs, and $200 million is added into the Israeli economy. It doesn’t matter: Use a camel, swim there — just come.”
Schools, shuls and camps constitute the pleasant side of Jewish life. But Judaism covers every base, including the sad times. There is a Jewish way in death and mourning, and it is one of the most admired aspects of Jewish religious culture. Yet even there, some associated costs could clobber some families.
Mortuary, funeral and cemetery costs don’t come cheap. A Jewish funeral averages around $4,000, with caskets adding anywhere from $900 to $9,000 to the tab. Burial plots average around $6,000.
Local professionals in the Jewish mortuary business do what they can to help bereaved families afford a proper funeral. “We have ways of easing the burden,” says Gene Kaufman of Sinai Memorial Chapel. “We allow people to pay out charges [interest-free] over a period of time. We do charge a finance charge if they don’t pay off, but never is there hardship.”
And as has long been the case, buying a plot or a funeral in advance locks in a lower price than waiting until tragedy strikes.
Most importantly, notes Kaufman, no matter what a person’s financial status, no Jew will go without a proper Jewish funeral, complete with all traditional rights. “One thing we do,” he says, “is we provide services for indigents with no funds at all.”
For struggling middle-class couples, some days they must feel like they’re headed for indigence themselves. The JCF’s Bluestone encourages those families to ask for help, even if it makes them uncomfortable.
“They should apply, but they’re not going to,” she says. “They recognize there are much needier people, and they think, ‘Why should we apply when other people should apply?’”
That sentiment resonates with mother-of-two Pavlovsky.
“If you look at it objectively, these numbers are outrageous and prohibitive,” she says of the costs of living a Jewish life. “But if you look at the efforts [communal organizations] make to make it possible, it’s a different story. I don’t have any issues with asking for help. There’s no shame.”
Aylon Engler, too, understands a dollar only stretches so far. But he also believes an investment in Jewish life is well worth any financial squeeze.
“We lead by example,” he says. “The only way you can maintain that identity is by participating. You can’t just give it lip service. If you don’t do anything Jewish in your life, you will pay for it with your kids not sticking with it.”
Cover photo illustration by Cathleen Maclearie
CopyrightJ, the Jewish news weekly of Northern California