July 28, 2008

At Ohavi Zedek Synagogue, we are working hard to understand our members and our purpose. This commitment is a part of our mission to energetically enrich and serve the diverse spiritual, emotional, and social needs of our members, through both traditional and innovative approaches to our Jewish heritage.

As we informed our members who attended the June Congregational Meeting, the Board of Directors has agreed to engage in a strategic visioning and planning process. We have named our process Tikvah 2020. We have engaged the services of Bob Leventhal, a senior consultant from the Alban Institute, to facilitate this process. The Alban Institute is an ecumenical, interfaith organization that supports congregations through consulting services, book publishing, educational seminars and research.

Tikvah 2020 will allow us to gather data from a cross section of our membership to identify key congregational opportunities and issues that need to be addressed, and will allow us to establish priorities for our future, including building a five-year financial business plan. The outcomes of this process include creating a shared understanding of and agreement on the synagogue's values, priorities and goals to guide us in our future decisions, engaging new leaders, and promoting the importance of our members' involvement.

The most important element for the success of Tikvah 2020 is wide congregational input and involvement in the process. We want to hear from as many of our members as possible. Through parlor meetings that bring together 8 to 10-member groups representing different segments of the synagogue (i.e. new members, longstanding members, families with Hebrew School children, empty nesters, etc.), larger visioning and planning workshops and town hall meetings, we will gather input and information from all of you.

To guide our congregation through Tikvah 2020, we have developed a diverse steering committee, whose members include:

Our steering committee held its first meeting with Bob Leventhal on July 10th. More than 20 members spent three hours with Bob, learning about strategic visioning and planning and engaging in training exercises to prepare us to engage our congregation during the input-gathering phase. We will be in touch with you in the coming weeks with opportunities to participate in parlor meetings prior to the High Holy Days.

We are excited about the start of our visioning process and invite you to visit the Tikvah 2020 link on our website www.ohavizedek.com to stay informed of our progress and of opportunities to get involved. We encourage and look forward to your participation in our Tikvah 2020 conversations.

L'Shalom,

Yoram Samets, Chair, Tikvah 2020

Rabbi Joshua Chasan

Basha Brody, President

Mike Kanarick, Executive Director