In our cover story, we visit Orthodox communities across the country that have witnessed significant growth over the past few years. Places like Kansas City, Springfield, New Jersey and Detroit, Michigan are flourishing . . . the question is, why? We asked key players involved in building these and other frum communities: What are the key ingredients necessary to grow a community? In the section that follows, we share the stories of a few thriving communities and the secrets behind their success.
BY BARBARA BENSOUSSAN
I’ve always wanted to redo Saul Steinberg’s famous New Yorker cover “View of the World from 9th Avenue” as “An Orthodox New Yorker’s View of the World” [Ed.: see the cover of this issue!]. It would have Brooklyn at the center, surrounded by the other boroughs and Long Island, with perhaps Teaneck, Bergenfield as well as Passaic and Lakewood on the periphery and places like Chicago and Los Angeles mere specks on the horizon.
ut of an estimated 700,000 Orthodox Jews in North America, close to 500,000 can be found in New York City, Long Island and Westchester according to the UJA-Federation of New York’s 2011 demographic study (that doesn’t even include the rest of the tri-state area, such as Rockland County, New Jersey and Connecticut). It’s nice to know that Orthodox Judaism is flourishing in the New York area. The bad news is that, well, it’s getting awfully crowded. Crowding means many things: it means the price of housing has risen way beyond the means of middle-class families and young couples just starting out; it means greater anonymity, a higher-stress lifestyle and fighting for parking spaces. The answer? Go west, young man . . . or south, or north! “People come to Kansas City, they see our great community and they walk away saying, ‘Who knew?’” says Rabbi Daniel Rockoff of Congregation Beth Israel Abraham & Voliner (BIAV).
Kansas City is one of a number of cities across the country whose Orthodox population has seen tremendous growth in the past five to ten years. In Overland Park, for example, a suburb of Kansas City, BIAV boasts more than 150 families—thirty of whom moved in within the last five years. “We’re trying to create buzz about Kansas City; create some traffic here,” says Rabbi Rockoff. Apparently, he’s succeeding; the shul welcomed twenty newborns in the past year alone. Congregation Israel, a Modern Orthodox synagogue in Springfield, New Jersey, expanded its shul building two years ago to accommodate its growing membership. Now, says Rabbi Judah Isaacs, director of the OU Department of Community Engagement, the shul may have to renovate again—its new quarters are beginning to feel cramped. While ten years ago Springfield had only a handful of families with parents under the age of thirty-five, today there are almost forty young families. “We’ve been adding almost one
* Most of the shuls mentioned in this section are OU-member shuls.
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Winter 5774/2013 JEWISH ACTION 25