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essay
The Contours of Our
Jewish Community:
Snapshots from the 2018
Population Study
Editor’s Note: Each week, the Jewish News will offer insights into the
findings of the 2018 Detroit Jewish Population Study with the intent
of stimulating discussion about its potential meaning and impact.
Navigating the Shifting
JCC Landscape
D
ata from the 2018 and
the 2005 Detroit Jewish
community population
studies show the West Bloomfield-
based Jewish Community Center
of Metropolitan Detroit continues
to face membership and percep-
tion challenges while also showing
more participation by non-mem-
bers in the programs it hosts.
The random-sampling method-
ology utilized by lead investigator
Ira Sheskin reports 8 percent of the
community’s 31,500 Jewish house-
holds have a JCC membership.
It was 15 percent in 2005. JCC
in-house surveys report 3 percent
Jewish household membership in
2018 and 10 percent in 2005.
Further illustrating the shift
away from membership, the 1989
Detroit Jewish community popu-
lation study conducted by Steven
Cohen and Jack Ukeles reported 21
percent of Jewish households with
JCC memberships.
In the 2018 study, 35 percent
of those who said they were very
or somewhat familiar with the
JCC gave it an excellent rating.
However, 21 percent gave it a fair
or poor rating, placing Detroit’s
JCC 27th out of 32 communities
similarly surveyed around the
country.
The fair or poor ratings
were higher among Oak Park/
Huntington Woods respondents
(31 percent), donors to Federation’s
annual campaign (32 percent) and
those who were asked but declined
to donate to Federation’s annual
campaign (46.5 percent).
In recent years, efforts have
been made to de-emphasize
8
November 22 • 2018
jn
membership metrics and focus on
attracting people to attend JCC-
sponsored programs. According
to the 2018 study, 43 percent of
the Jewish community’s non-JCC
member households had someone
participate in a JCC program in
a recent 12-month period. This
increased from 30 percent report-
ed in the 2005 study (the Berman
Center for the Performing Arts
opened at the JCC in the period
between the studies). Programs
attended included book fair, film
festival, music festival, adult Jewish
learning, etc.
According to the 2017-2018
annual report of the Jewish
Federation/United Jewish
Foundation, the JCC received
$4,167,382 from the annual cam-
paign and $2,177,715 in other
support (including endowment
contributions) for a total of
$6,345,097. ■
QUESTION:
When the JCC opened its West
Bloomfield location in 1975, it was
the largest JCC structure in North
America. It was built upon core
assumptions of attracting Jewish
families from Flint to Ann Arbor,
providing activities and services that
would appeal to all age groups, and
extending Northwestern Highway
beyond its current Orchard Lake
Road terminus. As the JCC pursues
a strategy focusing on programmatic
outreach and de-emphasizing the
JCC’s physical attributes, what would
you recommend the community do
with the building?
There’s Nothing New About this
Wave of Anti-Semitism
S
ince 11 Jews were murdered
him shout that I was a dirty kike and
on Nov. 4 at the Tree of Life
to consider myself lucky I was still
Synagogue in the Squirrel Hill
alive. He gave me the conditions that
neighborhood in Pittsburgh, it seems
would determine my freedom. I could
like every media outlet has a theory
come out when I accepted Jesus.
as to why anti-Semitism is on the
Jesus again. By now any uncertainty
rise.
about this guy’s status had vanished.
The reporting is non-stop, from
If only I had known Jesus was a Jew.
Linda
Laderman
in-depth analyses in the New York
That might have changed everything.
Times of the psychology that under-
Again, I remembered what my
lies hatred of Jews to cable news personalities mother said when my neighbor on the other
convening panels whose members feign
side, Patty, came by, intent on converting me
disbelief at the intensity of the ugliness tar-
to Catholicism. We sat on my gray concrete
geted at Jews. It’s as if anti-Semitism were a
steps when she announced that I would be
contemporary phenomenon, rather than a
allowed to play at her house as long as I had
2,000-year-old trope.
a communion. “You’ll get to wear a bride
Not long after the murders in Pittsburgh,
dress.” Even though it was a warm September
I was sitting in my bed writing while I
day, the concrete felt so cold pressed against
half-watched an edition of Meet the Press. I
my bare legs.
turned the sound off right after they showed
Still, her offer sounded pretty good. A
a clip of President Trump discussing the syn- frilly white dress, a veil, a blue beaded rosary,
agogue shooting. I should have turned it off
a Bible and a visit to her house. I wanted
before he started talking.
that. I was in second grade, and I wanted to
My stomach tightened as he blamed the
play at Patty’s house.
victims for their inability to defend them-
We were the only Jews left in the neigh-
selves. Then I laughed and said to the air, “Of borhood. To my mother’s credit, she man-
course it’s their fault.” Scapegoating is noth-
aged to get me across town to religious
ing new to Jews.
school and, later, to Hebrew school, where
Just this week, I was talking with my friend I met my teacher, a kind woman with a sad
Alex, a financial planner, who told me he
smile. She had blue numbers etched into her
hadn’t experienced overt anti-Semitism until
flesh. Even though it was 1959, the numbers
he was an adult. He’d grown up in a Jewish
looked fresh.
community much like Squirrel Hill. When
By now, the search for approval from my
he made the mistake of telling clients that he
neighbors had evolved into a desire to know
wasn’t available on Saturdays because he was
more about why they had such disdain for
Jewish, they pulled their business from him.
me.
Told him he was satanic.
I knew Jews were different from most
Unlike my friend, I knew what Jew hatred
Americans. I knew when I was sent home
was from the time I was old enough to be
from Hebrew school because swastikas were
told by my mother that our Catholic neigh-
painted on the windows, and I knew when
bors hated us because they think we killed
I was cajoled into singing Christmas carols
Jesus. “They hate us on Good Friday but not
at my public school, where I was one of two
as much on Easter when they believe he rose Jews.
again,” she declared, nodding her head in
In honor of my Lithuanian grandmother
agreement with herself.
who often reminded me, “Don’t think it can’t
At that point, I didn’t know what the sig-
happen here,” I told myself I would defend
nificance of my mother’s reference to Jesus
Judaism wherever and whenever I could. I
was, but I was pretty sure he was someone
would be brave. I would shout down anyone
whose very existence was the source of a lot
who disparaged my people.
of trouble for Jews.
That childish notion disappeared long ago.
My mother’s words were a warning I could And now with our country on the precipice,
never forget.
I’m not so sure.
They were with me when I was 8 years old
I’m leaning toward silence. It’s safer. ■
and Harry, the boy next door, locked me in
his yellow woodshed, just feet from the chain Linda Laderman is a Detroit area freelance writer who
often writes about social justice issues.
link fence that separated our houses.
Sitting on the damp mud floor, I heard