H eadlines
New Book Explores Jewish Life Today
L OCA L
JARRAD SAFFREN | JE STAFF
THE QUESTION OF what
the Jewish community looks
like in the 21st century has not
quite been answered yet. In an
increasingly digital age, with
younger generations that are
less committed to traditional
institutions, it’s a question with
no easy answer.

But a new book, “Warm and
Welcoming,” edited by Jewish
Exponent contributor Miriam
Steinberg-Egeth, attempts to
answer it.

Steinberg-Egeth’s book, as
its title alludes, tries to define
those modern challenges under
the label of inclusivity. There
are chapters on welcoming
LGBTQ Jews, interfaith
families, Jews of color and Jews
with disabilities. There also
are sections on how to build
Jewish life around the desires
and habits of millennial and
Generation Z Jews, with such
chapters focusing on millen-
nials and Gen Z people in
general, education, fundraising
and marketing.

If inclusivity is the unifying
challenge, adaptation is the
8 DECEMBER 16, 2021
unifying action that Jewish
institutions need to take,
according to Steinberg-Egeth
and her authors, five of whom
live in the Philadelphia area or
have Philadelphia ties.

“Warm and Welcoming,”
published by Rowman &
Littlefield, came out Nov. 15
and is available on Amazon.

com. Each author is an expert
in the field in which he or she
wrote about, Steinberg-Egeth
said. The Exponent contrib-
utor has been “a leader in the
Philadelphia Jewish commu-
nity since 2006,” according to
her editor bio on the book’s
website. She has worked for
the Center City Kehillah, the
Board of Rabbis of Greater
Philadelphia and the Hillel of
Greater Philadelphia’s Jewish
Graduate Student Network.

Her co-editor, Warren
Hoffman, is the executive
director for the Association
for Jewish Studies in New
York, per the site. He worked
with Steinberg-Egeth in
Philadelphia for several years
as the associate director of
community programming
for the Jewish Federation of
Warren Hoffman
Courtesy of Miriam Steinberg-Egeth
Greater Philadelphia and as
senior director of program-
ming for the Gershman Y.

“I care deeply about the
Jewish community, and
the Jewish community has
to be a place where people
feel comfortable,” Steinberg-
Egeth said. “Being able to
get this work out into the
world was a really incredible
opportunity.” Hoffman came up with
the idea for the book and
was working with a publisher
before the pandemic. But in
May 2020, he asked his old
friend to join him.

According to Steinberg-
Egeth, Hoffman knew she
was a capable writer who had
done other writing projects.

He also knew that she was
used to considering deep and
important questions about
Jewish life.

For the Exponent, Steinberg-
Egeth writes “Miriam’s Advice
Well,” an advice column.

Often, her answers to readers
either have practical or moral
implications — or both.

Recently, she has been
getting a lot of questions about
interfaith families. So as she
thought about that dynamic,
she realized that her answer
applied to the modern Jewish
community more broadly.

JEWISH EXPONENT
Miriam Steinberg-Egeth
“The importance of inclu-
sion and that welcoming
spirit,” the writer said. “Valuing
people’s experiences.”
The book’s Philadelphia-
based writers,
Gabby Kaplan-Mayer, Beverly Socher-
Lerner, Rebecca Bar and Rabbi
Mike Uram, all dig into those
themes, too.

Kaplan-Mayer runs
an inclusion program for
Jewish Learning Venture, a
Jenkintown nonprofit that
helps Jewish families build
Jewish lives. Her chapter
focuses on disability access.

In it, she explains that the
Americans with Disabilities
Act of 1990 does not apply
to synagogues and religious
buildings. Therefore, it’s
incumbent upon those places
to take up disability access as a
moral imperative.

“Each community really
needs to do the work and talk
to their congregants,” she said.

In Jewish educational
institutions, the challenge is
slightly different, according
to Socher-Lerner, who wrote
the book’s education chapter.

Jewish enrichment programs
need to find their community
members, she said.

Socher-Lerner is
the founding director of the
Makom Community in Philly,
Courtesy of Miriam Steinberg-Egeth
which tries to modernize
Jewish education. Makom
developed a program in which
Jewish students can attend a
Jewish program after school
five days a week. It even
organizes transportation to
help working parents.

“It fits in their lives,” she
said of the program.

And once Judaism fits in
their lives, it starts informing
how they live.

“Our Jewish education has
to be one where we constantly
reflect our Jewish wisdom onto
our community and into our
relationships,” Socher-Lerner
said. “So we can grow into who
we want to be.”
So to become more inclu-
sive, and to adapt to new
generations that don’t view
institutions as worthy just
because, Jewish organizations
must change how they think
about their relationships with
community members.

Jewish life today is about
filling a spiritual need more
than a practical one.

“Investing deeply in people
and relationships from a place
of empathy,” Socher-Lerner
said. “Not just getting them to
invest more and donate more.” l
jsaffren@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



H eadlines
Family Company Celebrates Century Via Giving
L OCA L
SASHA ROGELBERG | JE STAFF
ACCORDING TO BRETT
Cohen, the fourth-generation
family member to work at
Clarke & Cohen Property Loss
Consultants, being a public
insurance adjuster “is not all
peaches and gravy.”
But after 100 years of
helping clients settle insurance
claims after house fires and
property destruction, Clarke &
Cohen wants to give back to its
community. The consultant company is
hosting a series of “random
acts of kindness” this month,
holding a Chanukah and
Christmas toy drive at its Bala
Cynwyd office in partnership
with Manayunk Development
Corp. for the Northlight
Community Center. It hosted
a coat drive with Our Closet
and the Bethesda Project and
dropped off food to fire stations
in the city, suburbs and down
the shore earlier in December.

“It’s fortunate to be in
business for 100 years; it’s
fortunate to be able to work
with your family, and it’s fortu-
nate to have the success and
the growth in our company
that we’ve had,” said Richard
Cohen, Clarke & Cohen CEO
and father of Brett Cohen.

“This was an opportunity ...

to really give back and make a
difference.” Clarke & Cohen is licensed
in 27 states and is a charter
member of the National
Association of public insur-
ance adjusters. Four members
of Clarke & Cohen have
served as president of that
trade organization, including
Richard Cohen.

But like many Jewish family
businesses, the consulting
company had
humble beginnings.

Clarke & Cohen was
founded by Simon Clarke and
Leon Cohen, who were origi-
nally partners in the salvage
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM Richard Cohen (right) with father Barry Cohen and grandfather Gene
Lerner in 1996
1994 and owner in 2004. He
was responsible for modern-
izing the company, which, at
the beginning of his employ-
ment, didn’t even have copy or
fax machines — just a mimeo-
graph machine.

Though his father expected
him to follow in his footsteps,
Richard Cohen has no qualms
fulfilling his role of heir.

“I pretty much found that
[passion] right away,” he said.

Though Richard Cohen
is keen to keep the business
in family hands, he avoided
putting pressure on his son
and nephew Blake Zucker.

That didn’t matter— they both
started working for Clarke &
Cohen on their own volition.

After graduating college,
Brett Cohen began working for
a client of Clarke & Cohen’s at
the time.

“I saw what my family’s
company came in and was able
to do and how that was able
to help such a large manage-
ment company,” he said. “At
that point, it was apparent to
me that I had a unique oppor-
tunity that not a lot of people
have and that I should take
advantage of.”
Brett Cohen, 29, has worked
at Clarke & Cohen for four
years, now alongside Zucker.

He plans on filling his father’s
footsteps as owner one day.

“This is kind of a calling
of sorts,” Brett Cohen said.

“When something happens,
we’re there to help people make
it better.”
Donations for Clarke
& Cohen’s toy drive can be
dropped off at 510 Belmont
Ave. in Bala Cynwyd. l
srogelberg@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0741
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Rich Cohen (center) with nephew Blake Zucker and son Brett Cohen
(right) in 2019
Courtesy of Clarke & Cohen
industry before Pennsylvania
passed the first public adjuster
law in 1921. The partners
shifted business models, setting
up an office at 229 Chestnut St.

Clarke was an Irish Jew —
his cousin was the mayor of
Dublin at some point.

“He was very observant,”
Richard Cohen said. “If you
had a fire or a loss on the
Sabbath, you couldn’t speak to
him. You had to wait until the
Sabbath was over for him to
help you.”
Ten years into Clarke and
Cohen’s public adjuster business,
Clarke left after a disagreement,
leaving the Cohens at the helm
of the business.

Richard Cohen’s grand-
father became the business
owner in the 1940s, and his
father began working for the
company in 1963. The company
moved then to its office in Bala
Cynwyd. Richard Cohen, the
only grandson, joined in 1988
after graduating from The
Pennsylvania State University.

He was a first-generation
college graduate.

“It was pretty much always
an expectation that I would
join the business,” he said. “My
parents actually joked that they
considered naming me Clarke
Cohen.” Richard Cohen became a
partner of Clarke & Cohen in
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