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the
Father- F
Daughter
Team
VIVIAN HENOCH SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
Melyn and Karen Rubenfire
JOHN HARDWICK
Meet the Rubenfires,
Detroit activists
and founders of Project
Healthy Community.
COMMUNITY IS INVITED
The Jewish Community Relations
Council/AJC will honor Dr. Melvyn
Rubenfire and Karen Rubenfire as
the recipients of the 2018 Activist
Award, 7 p.m. Thursday, May
31, at Adat Shalom Synagogue.
Reservations for the main program
with featured speaker Hon. Steven
Rhodes are $18 per person. A pre-
glow strolling dinner will begin at
6 p.m. for sponsors and donors
$180+. For sponsor information
and reservations, visit jcrcajc.org.
Thirty kids come to the Schulze Afterschool Program
and more are on the waiting list.
our days a week at
the Fredrick J. Schulze
Elementary School in
Northwest Detroit, 30 youngsters
in grades K-2 (and some of their
older siblings, too), stay after
school for a light meal, literacy-
building activities and some
extra tender-loving mentoring
— all as part of Project Healthy
Community.
A volunteer-driven, multi-faith
and interracial nonprofit enter-
prise to benefit the families of
Northwest Detroit, Project Healthy
Community was inspired by Rabbi
Joshua Bennett of Temple Israel
and established in 2012 through
the collaboration of longtime
congregants Dr. Melvyn Rubenfire,
his late wife, Diane, and their
daughter, Karen Rubenfire, work-
ing in partnership with Hartford
Memorial Baptist Church and
leadership of the Northwest
Activities Center.
For those, like Melvyn, who
grew up in Northwest Detroit in
the 1950s, the schools with the
names Schulze, Bagley, Pasteur
and Mumford all evoke fond mem-
ories of the “old Jewish neighbor-
hood.” What many remember as
the JCC around the corner is now
the Northwest Activities Center,
a thriving anchor of the neigh-
borhood. Thanks to Melvyn and
Karen, the Northwest Activities
Center now serves as home base
for Project Healthy Community
(PHC).
Seeking strategic partnerships
to serve the neighborhood, PHC
has teamed up with dozens of
community funders and orga-
nizations, including Hartford
Memorial Baptist Church,
Gleaners Community Food Bank
of Southeastern Michigan and
Forgotten Harvest. Currently,
PHC’s growing roster of projects
includes after-school program-
ming, a mobile food pantry,
Fundamentals for Nutrition (FUN)
pantry for children, Summer
in the City camp, an urban gar-
den and the Farber Scholarship
Program.
CALL IT BESHERT
It’s a story Melvyn Rubenfire likes
to tell; launching Project Healthy
Community has been a highlight
in his long and distinguished
career. A preventive cardiologist
in practice for nearly 50 years
as Sinai’s Chief of Cardiology, a
professor of internal medicine at
Wayne State and, since 1991, the
director of Preventive Cardiology
and professor of internal medi-
cine at the University of Michigan,
Melvyn led the charge to create
PHC with Diane and Karen.
“We had the desire and tenta-
tive plans to start a fresh food
pantry in the city,” Melvyn said,
“but we didn’t have a focal
point until 2012, when Rabbi
Bennett delivered a sermon on
Yom Kippur, calling congregants
to action through community
service, specifically suggesting
we partner with the Northwest
Activities Center.
“The rabbi’s words resonated
with us,” Melvyn continued. “The
Northwest Activities Center was in
the neighborhood where we grew
up, and it was in our soul, too. I
went to Mumford High, a block
from the Center; my career began
in Detroit at Sinai Hospital. Giving
back was the right thing to do.”
It was the Monday following
Yom Kippur when Melvyn and
Diane dropped into the center,
just to introduce themselves and
to “see what the center was all
about.”
What they found was the place
in shambles and a volunteer in
the lobby with an apology, “Sorry,
there’s no one here to help you
today and our director is in a
meeting with the board.”
At that, Melvyn explained they
were from Temple Israel and they
just wanted to take a tour.
“Our timing that day couldn’t
have been better,” Melvyn said. “I
still get chills when I think of our
first conversation with the center’s
Executive Director Ron Locket,
when he stepped out of his meet-
ing, smiled and asked, ‘What can
I do for you? Our board is in the
next room talking about closing
our doors and selling the center.’
“I told him he might want to
reconsider that decision, then
proceeded to explain that Temple
Israel was thinking of making
the Northwest Activities Center
a partner in an enterprise to pro-
mote literacy and nutrition to
improve the health of the commu-
nity in the neighborhood — and
that we were two of about 3,500
families, 10,000 members strong,
continued on page 20
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May 24 • 2018
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