Edith Goodman plays a tune from "Fiddler on the Roof"

lUr

hatever you do, don't refer
to the Jewish Federation
Apartments as "an old folks
home." Unless you want to
anger the residents.
"People make that mistake all the
time," says Marsha Goldsmith Kamin, the
executive director of the JFA. "[Residents]
would look at you and say, 'I'm not old.'"
In fact, Kamin says, "They are active
and vibrant in both their own community
within the buildings and in the outside
community. The residents at Prentis and
Teitel (in Oak Park) are active with their
neighbors at the Jewish Community Cen-
ter and both synagogues (Young Israel of
Oak Park and Temple Emanu-El)."
Residents at Hechtman in West Bloom-
field are involved with the West Bloom-
field schools and library and are part of
the "Dor 1' Dor" intergenerational pro-

3/27

1998

80

gram with Hillel Day School.
For four days, between Feb. 27-and
March 9, The Jewish News dropped in on
JFA residents for an up-close view of their
everyday lives.
We saw them celebrate a Shabbat meal
together, dance, learn how to use comput-
ers and bid a teary farewell to a beloved
staffer. We watched as residents made
hamantashen for Purim and as they lined
up for blood pressure checks. And we
talked to Edith Goodman, who kindly
invited us into her apartment for a chat.
Although incorporated in 1967, the
first JFA building, Prentis, was built on
the Jewish Community Campus in Oak
Park in 1971. Eight years later, Prentis II
went up. Hechtman I was built in 1983
on the Jewish Community Campus in
West Bloomfield, followed 10 years later
by Hechtman II. Teitel was built in 1989
across from Prentis.

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With the exception of Hechtman II,
which is a market-rate building; the first
four buildings were subsidized by the U.S.
Department of Housing and Urban
Development.
More than 670 residents — average
age, 81 — live in the five buildings, and
900 more people are waiting to move in.
The minimum age is 62.
Kamin likens each building to a town:
Each has its own executive committee,
and all the residents vote on issues that
affect how their building is run.
"The residents don't have to participate
in everything," Kamin says, "but it's there
IF they want to."
Says Teitel resident Rose Schwartz,
"There are a lot of different people that .
live together here, and we learn to live
together. Everyone looks out for each
other. Whoever started this should be
blessed."