H eadlines
Spector Continued from Page 1
across all sectors, including
with private, public and philan-
thropic organizations.

Spector is stepping down
on Feb. 7. He will be replaced
by Cynthia Figueroa, who
comes to JEVS after several
years of working for the City of
Philadelphia. “I really had an opportunity
to turn JEVS into a signifi-
cant human service nonprofit
allowing individuals to live
independent lives,” Spector
said. “It’s been incredibly
rewarding.” As he thought back on his
career, the outgoing president
did some math. Forty-plus
years of helping thousands of
people each year.

“That’s a large number,” he
said. When he examined his time
with JEVS more deeply, Spector
identified one key area where he
made a big impact: expanding
opportunities for young people.

In 1979, the year Spector
joined the organization,
JEVS already ran the Orleans
Vocational Center. But in
2007, under his leadership, the
nonprofit expanded the center
into Orleans Technical College.

The school, based in
Philadelphia, offers trade and
technology courses that can
help launch careers.

“We built a new school that
was more state-of-the-art,”
Spector said.

“That has been a significant
piece of my accomplishments,”
he added. “Being able to keep
it flowing with students and
financial resources.”
Spector also pointed to
another youth program,
Project WOW, as a strong part
of his legacy.

Project WOW focuses on
helping kids that JEVS describes
as “disconnected youth.” Those
are young people who are out of
school without having earned
high school diplomas.

The project is a 22-week
course in trades and technol-
ogies that is combined with
a GED program. That way,
students graduate from WOW
with the core credential, a
high school diploma and the
skills that will enable them to
compete in the economy.

“That can lead to life-sus-
taining jobs and careers,”
Spector said.

Spector said that in helping
young people, the nonprofit
is staying true to its original
mission, too. The organization
started in 1941 to help Jewish
refugees. Jay Spector speaks at a JEVS event. 
JEVS was aiding a specific
group of people with a specific
set of problems. It is still
doing that to this day, even
if it doesn’t just assist Jewish
refugees anymore. Spector’s
organization serves both Jews
and non-Jews, too.

“It’s really about tikkun
olam. How to repair the world,”
Spector said. “As a Jew, I look at
it like we have a responsibility
to ensure that everybody has
an opportunity.”
The outgoing CEO is leaving
Figueroa with a wide-ranging
and multifaceted organiza-
tion. JEVS had about 200 staff
members when Spector took
over in the 1990s. Now it has
almost 1,000.

Lisa Washington, the chair
of JEVS’ board of directors
who has served on the board
for more than a decade, said
those staffers will miss their
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longtime leader.

“He is the ultimate mensch,”
Washington added. “He has
the biggest heart and is the
most caring person.”
The board chair believes that
Spector’s success is the result of
his attitude. Over many years
and decades, he has never
changed in that regard. He has
always stayed positive.

“After being in this business
for as long as he’s been in, to
not be cynical, to have hope,
to still be able to feel like he
can make a difference, is just
amazing to me,” she said. “I
work at it every day, but it’s not
that easy.”
In retirement, Spector
hopes to stay active with JEVS’
foundation and as a public
policy advocate, focusing on
issues around poverty.

He also wants to spend
more time with his wife, Genie
Cohen, his two sons, Michael
and Adam Spector, and his
four grandsons, all under 10.

“It’s the passage of time,” he
said of his retirement. “I loved
the work I did. It was a hard
decision to make.” l
jsaffren@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



F TAY-SACHS
R F R E E E E
H eadlines
Security Continued from Page 1
that though their systems could
always be improved, what they
had in place felt appropriate in
case of an attack of Colleyville’s
caliber. “We have a lot of things in
place that have been recom-
mended previously, and we got
funding from various security
grants to enable us to have a
robust system that we were
pretty happy with,” Allen said.

After the Tree of Life
shooting, the Jewish Federation
of Greater Philadelphia and the
Pennsylvania Jewish Coalition
advocated for the creation of
a statewide nonprofit grant
program for agencies that are
victims of hate crimes.

Congregation Or Ami is one
of 38 Jewish institutions in the
area that received state funding
in 2020. Twenty-four local
institutions received grants in
2021. The 2022 grant process
will open soon, and Jewish
Federation has retained a grant
writing consultant to advise
local agencies applying for these
security funds.

The Jewish Federations
of North America, which
announced a $54 million
LiveSecure security grant
in October, will expedite the
distribution of those funds,
beginning next month, as a
balm for anxious synagogue
leaders in the wake of the
Colleyville crisis.

There also are federal
nonprofit security grants of at
least $180 million going through
the federal appropriations
process, as well as a new $4.5
million budget allocation from
the Pennsylvania Legislature.

As many synagogues across
the country, like Or Ami,
reconsider or double-down on
security precautions in place,
others are choosing to forgo
security guards and surveil-
lance, examining the meaning
of safety in their community.

After Colleyville, Rabbi
Ari Lev Fornari of Kol Tzedek
synagogue in West Philadelphia
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM wrote in an email, “In this
moment of heightened fear,
especially in this moment, we
recommit to finding a path
to personal and collective
safety that does not increase
the presence of police in our
community.” In the last week of January,
Kol Tzedek invited Subduction
Consulting, a Portland, Oregon-
based nonprofit providing
transformative justice and
equity training, to host a three-
part de-escalation training for
community members.

“Even in the best of situations
when law enforcement does
exactly what they’re supposed
to do — and we know they can
de-escalate — we know that we
are better positioned to de-es-
calate in our own community,”
Kol Tzedek board President
Elana Baurer said.

Baurer describes
the synagogue as a “multiracial
community,” a home to Black
Jews and Jews of color, as well
as LGBTQ Jews — popula-
tions that historically were
the victims of police violence.

A Nov. 11 Washington Post
analysis reported that police
fatally shot Black men at twice
the rate of white men.

“Many of us don’t feel like
police keep our communities
safe,” Baurer said.

De-escalation training
provides an opportunity for
community members to address
interpersonal conflicts, often
nonviolent in nature and much
more frequent than violent,
antisemitic attacks, without law
enforcement. “Securit y
training strengthens muscle memory so
when faced with an emergency
you know what to do,” Jewish
Federation President and CEO
Michael Balaban said.

Jew ish
Emergenc y
Preparedness Project CEO
Yoni Ari said the organiza-
tion is working on a yearlong
three-part training for Jewish
institutions to develop a
“culture of preparedness” in
times of natural disasters or
safety breaches, which includes
security training.

In times of conflict, a
fight, flight or freeze response
is activated in individuals,
according to Subduction
Consulting founder Theresa
Logan. De-escalation training
gives individuals tools to
distance themselves from an
initial response of fear or anger.

“We have the ability to bring
some modicum, hopefully, of
justice, a little bit of tranquility
and a little bit more even-mind-
edness when conflict does
arise,” Subduction Consulting
facilitator and partner Carlos
Kareem Windham said. “It’s
not that conflicts won’t arise —
they will. It’s part of life. How
we respond to them, though, is
the piece that, if we practice it,
we work at it, it is something we
have a choice in.”
Congregation Beth Israel
Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker
attributes similar de-escalation
training to his managing of the
hostage crisis.

“As a part of rabbinic
training, as a part of training
as clergy we talk a lot about
the idea of being a calm,
non-anxious presence, we do
that in hospital rooms; we do
that during the most difficult
individual moments,” Cytron-
Walker said in a Jan. 17 CBS
interview. Cytron-Walker
recalled preparing tea for gunman
Malik Faisal Akram when he
entered the sanctuary, asking
him questions and speaking
with him at length, de-esca-
lation strategies Windham
recommends and that have
been successful in the past.

“One of the strategies is just,
can you recognize this person’s
humanity?,” Subduction Con-
sulting founder Theresa Logan
said. “Because if you can see
their humanity and understand
what is happening for them ...

Are they trying to get atten-
tion? Are they in need of mental
health or other kinds of health
care? — We can start to identify
what strategy might help.”
De-escalation training is not
a panacea for security threats,
JEWISH EXPONENT
Windham and Logan admit. If
one is in immediate danger, one
should do whatever they can
to protect themselves, including
calling law enforcement.

Grant Schmidt, a Jewish
armed security guard, is a
proponent of synagogues
employing more assertive
security tactics for this reason.

Security rarely presents or
uses a firearm, Schmidt said.

He has received de-escalation
training and insists that the
presence of his firearms is “irrel-
evant” in conflict situations.

Schmidt, who provides
security to synagogues on the
Main Line, suggests that arms
should always be present at
Jewish events.

But Windham argued that if
an armed individual approaches
a synagogue intending to harm,
the presence of an armed guard
won’t be able to stop an attack.

“What you really should
be there to do is to build
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community and worship —
that’s really the main thing
you’re there to do if you’re there
for synagogue,” Windham
said. “You can’t simultaneously
prepare for and prevent war.” l
srogelberg@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0741
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