The Jewish Fund Approves $6 Million in Grants

January 2003

For more information, contact Jodee Fishman Raines, (248) 203-1487

At its January 27th board meeting, The Jewish Fund approved $6 million in grants for 23 mostly health care related programs, $2.3 million to be paid this year.

The majority of the grants will benefit the Jewish community’s frail elderly, including $2.7 million for in-home support services and $1.5 million for a day care program for seniors with Alzheimer’s or similar illnesses. According to Jewish Fund Chair David Page, “One of The Jewish Fund’s top priorities is helping our community’s frail elderly maintain their dignity and avoid premature institutionalization. In the first five years of the Fund, we paid at total of $7.3 million for programs to benefit Jewish seniors, including $6.4 million to help establish three extremely critical programs — the day care and in-home programs mentioned above and an escorted transportation service run by Jewish Family Service. We expect that it will take some time before funding for those three critical programs is stabilized, and we are working with the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit to that end. These new, multi-year commitments will assure that the programs continue in the interim.”

While foundations nationwide are reducing their grants as the falling stock market cuts into their endowments, The Jewish Fund Board recognized that the poor economy means more people are in need. “You have to look at the people behind the numbers,” said Bob Naftaly, Vice Chair and Chair of The Jewish Fund Grants Committee. Board member Michael Maddin agreed, “During the worst of times, The Jewish Fund should help people maintain their dignity.” Maddin chairs the Fund’s Social Welfare Advisory Group, which keeps close tabs on the welfare programs in the Jewish community.

Helping individuals with special needs is another priority of The Jewish Fund. Among the January grants was a three-year, $300,000 commitment to the Jewish Community Center’s Kids All Together program, contingent upon the Federation raising funds for this and similar programs for special needs individuals.

Jewish Fund grants also will benefit programs outside of the Jewish community, including a partnership between Children’s Hospital of Michigan and Karmanos Cancer Institute to serve children with cancer and their families; a dental program for uninsured children in the Detroit Public Schools; a health career development program for students in the Oak Park Public Schools; a certified nurse practitioner at the Detroit Institute for Children; and continued sponsorship of the Jewish Community City Year team in partnership with the Federation, United Jewish Foundation and Jewish Community Council.

In addition, seven grants totaling $619,030 were awarded to the Detroit Medical Center to purchase equipment for Sinai-Grace Hospital and several of the DMC’s ophthalmology and vision care centers that are part of the Oakland Virtual Medical Center.

The Jewish Fund was created in 1996 from proceeds of the sale of Sinai Hospital to the Detroit Medical Center and has since awarded $20 million in grants to expand health and human services to residents of metropolitan Detroit.

Following is a complete listing of the dollars allocated and purposes of the latest awards.

  1. AMOD (Oak Park, Michigan): $10,000 for a 24-hour medical hotline and health education programs.
  2. Children’s Dental Health Foundation (Farmington Hills, Michigan): $120,000 over 3 years to provide dental services to uninsured children in Detroit.
  3. Children’s Hospital of Michigan & The Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute (Detroit, Michigan): $90,000 for the Friends Like Me program, a collaborative effort to expand support services to families of children with cancer.
  4. City Connect Detroit (Detroit, Michigan): $75,000 over 3 years to increase federal and national grant support for the City of Detroit and the metro Detroit nonprofit community.
  5. City Year (Detroit, Michigan): $225,000 over 3 years to sponsor the Jewish Community City Year team in partnership with the Federation, United Jewish Foundation and Jewish Community Council.
  6. The Detroit Institute for Children (Detroit, Michigan): $45,000 to employ a Certified Nurse Practitioner to help reduce the Institute’s waiting list.
  7. DMC/Weisberg Cancer Treatment Center (Farmington Hills, Michigan): $1,916 from the Benjamin R. Gutow Memorial Fund.
  8. DMC/Sinai-Grace Hospital (Detroit, Michigan): $38,552.80 to purchase a Millennium Anterior Phaco Machine for the Sinai Grace Department of Opthalmology’s Clear Vision Center.
  9. DMC/Sinai-Grace Hospital (Detroit, Michigan):: $183,873.49 to purchase a Coherent Carbon Dioxide Laser and Candela Vascular/Pigmented Lesion Laser.
  10. DMC/Sinai-Grace Hospital (Detroit, Michigan): $71,283.47 to purchase two Haig Streit Slit lamps for the Sinai-Grace Eye Clinic.
  11. DMC/Sinai-Grace Hospital (Detroit, Michigan):: $263,614 to purchase a Scanning Laser Ophthalmoscope and construct a pediatric rehabilitation area at the Vision Rehabilitation Institute at the Lahser/11 Mile Campus.
  12. DMC/Sinai-Grace Hospital (Detroit, Michigan):: $65,000 to purchase IMRT software for a new linear accelerator for Sinai-Grace Hospital.
  13. DMC/Sinai-Grace Hospital (Detroit, Michigan):: $6,500 for the 16th annual Bernard Maas Lecture Series.
  14. Friends of Camp Mak-A-Dream, Michigan Chapter (Bingham Farms, Michigan): $5,000 to send children with cancer from Michigan to Camp Mak-A-Dream in Montana and to create an alumni group.
  15. Jewish Apartments and Services, Jewish Family Service, Kadima (Oak Park/Southfield, Michigan): $2,696,000 over 4 years to provide in home support services to over 700 frail older adults so that they may continue to live as independently as possible in their own homes.
  16. Jewish Apartments & Services (Oak Park, Michigan): $75,000 over 3 years for a new mental health program in collaboration with Wayne State University and Jewish Family Service.
  17. Jewish Community Center (West Bloomfield, Michigan): $300,000 over 3 years for the Kids All Together Program to integrate children with disabilities into existing recreational and social programs at the JCC.
  18. Jewish Family Service (Oak Park, Michigan): $24,000 over a 6-month period to conduct a needs assessment and begin outreach and referral to meet the health care needs of uninsured and underinsured Jewish adults.
  19. Jewish Family Service (Oak Park, Michigan): $54,000 for Kehilah, a spiritual healing program.
  20. Jewish Home and Aging Services/JVS (West Bloomfield and Southfield, Michigan): $1,539,584 over 4 years for the Dorothy and Peter Brown Adult Day Care Program.
  21. Kadima (Southfield, Michigan): $65,000 to provide in home support services for low income adults with mental illness so that they can live as independently as possible.
  22. Oak Park Business and Education Alliance (Oak Park, Michigan): $10,000 to support a health career development program for students in the Oak Park Public Schools.
  23. Volunteer Impact (Southfield, Michigan): $15,000 to continue and expand the organization’s work to assist Jewish organizations in recruiting, training, coordinating and utilizing volunteers.

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