During Operation Protective Edge, rather than a focused special campaign, JFNA, as is its practice, opened a Mailbox collecting undesignated funds which it then designated for Victims of Terror. I have no doubt that the funds were then distributed to appropriate Israeli NGOs to provide care and comfort across Israel. Then, as the conflict itself came to an end, came the issues: the need to serve Victims of Terror did not end; JFNA merely determined unilaterally that it would set aside the millions left in the Fund for future use. Donors were certainly never consulted; perhaps a few federations were. There was no vote by the JFNA Board.
And, over the past 4 years, JFNA has doled out dollars from the Victims of Terror Fund raised during Protective Edge for the current crises. Who's watching; who's reviewing; who's approving? What are the criteria; what are the standards?
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the JFNA did engage in critical follow-up.There was a sense of pride at the professional and lay levels in the accomplishments in partnership with the beleaguered and remarkable Houston Jewish community. This was JFNA at its best. There was a playbook for meeting future emergencies. And, then, the future emergencies became more frequent. And each one was treated as sui generis, the playbook rewritten each time; staff borrowed for each emergency --a seeming unwillingness to acknowledge that with climate change has come a continuing string of weather catastrophes assaulting our cities, our Jewish communities large and small.
These are but two examples of many where JFNA shoots itself in the foot even as it strives to do good -- through a continuing lack of leadership, lack of process, lack of continuity. This inability to remain focused is one of JFNA's most terrible flaws; a leadership distracted by the next shiny object -- away from its core functions, away from its sacred obligations.
You will remember that early on in Silverman's terms, the then Board Chair embraced, without plan or process, what would have been the billion dollar fantasy of a free Jewish education for every child -- a beautiful idea, too bad it was run up the flagpole without prior discussion or thought. So Silverman (who by that time had already embraced, #ish, the Global Planning Table, 3 TribeFests and other "plans" soon left in the dust after the waste of millions...millions) embraced the "free education fantasy" until someone told him to stop.
Then there was the JAFI/Government of Israel/World Jewry Initiative. You remember, five years ago, a bold engagement plan emerged out of a series of think tanks convened by JAFI. And, then, as we wrote:
"As was related to me, the Jewish Agency Executive was advised that one Ayelet Shilo Tamir was recruited from MASA to "free up" Alan to work on what would be the moribund Government of Israel/JAFI Initiative. This appeared to many to be a real attempt by Natan Sharansky to have someone near the top of the JA bureaucracy who actually knew how to manage within the organization. But on her arrival, Hoffmann, who plays the bureaucracy like a chalil, appeared to go into a protective shield, and hired Yael Weiss Gadish to direct the work of the Initiative. Garish, who is said to be sorely lacking in the trust of the Agency staff, almost succeeded (and still might) in a plan that would, if implemented, sell out the Agency to Diaspora Affairs Director General Dvir Kahane, aiding Hoffmann, her sponsor, in the creation of an alternative to the Jewish Agency, the GOI Initiative's "Public Benefit Company" known sarcastically in Israel as "Sochnut B" -- a way too transparent effort to break the JA/GOI partnership that was engineered, incredibly, by the Jewish Agency itself. As the entire Initiative has apparently collapsed, Hoffmann has created a new position at JAFI for Gadish -- "Director of Strategic Planning" -- swelling the top of the bureaucracy even as the brain drain is on-going."And where was JFNA during the collapse of an Initiative that, had it been implemented as planned, would have fully engaged our continental organization, JFNA sat silently on the outside not even looking in.
No follow-up, no accountability...no nothing.
Rwexler
Posts
2 comments:
The inability to concentrate on anything is a function of JFNA, under a succession of lay Chairs and officers and theinept CEO of the past 9 years, having no agenda, no priorities and no programs of substance. So it just goes onand on like that haster you like tocompare it to, round and round it goes to no end. The exception, the gift of Kathy Mannjing's persistence, was so poorly thought through, and then so poorly executed as to waste millions of dollars.
You may have hopes for Mark Wilf's leadership but, unless he stands the professional staff from top down, in NY, DC and Jerusalem, asking them what they do and how they do it, and torecite their accomplishments, the shipwill continue to sink. (Maybe Daroff could respond with something, but those returns have proved more difficult under Trump "austerity.")
Does anyone believe that after three years as Chair, Richard Sandler could recite a series of JFNA accomplishments? Does anyone believe that he, or anyone else, could justify the JFNA Dues Budget let alone its total budget?
What has been wasted on this organization over the oast decade has been shameful.
There is no hope for JFNA in its current guise as a fake national organization of the federations. It curently 3xists only to perpetuate itself without regard for federations' needs let alone their wants. While the federations reorganize, JFNA should be reframed as a trade organization -- a small one.
Post a Comment