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Jewish Journal

Connect. Inform. Inspire.

April 12, 2001

Finding Work in a Bear Market

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It was a rough transition for Debbie Murphy. She had just emerged from a difficult divorce after being trapped for two decades in an abusive marriage. Two years ago, she found herself on her own for the first time, unemployed and unequipped.

"Even though I had a bachelor’s degree and a certificate in computer graphics," Murphy recalled, "my husband had never allowed me to work professionally, and I didn’t know the first thing about how to use my skills in the marketplace."

Then Murphy heard about WoMentoring, a program created by Jewish Vocational Service (JVS). The outreach organization matched up Murphy with mentor figure Kristen Silverman, a Woodland Hills-based graphic designer at G&G Print Shop. Working closely with Silverman helped Murphy regain her confidence.

"She is truly an inspiration," Murphy said. "She has a tireless energy that she gives in abundance. I cannot begin to express how much she has helped me because of her altruistic and loving nature."

Thanks to WoMentoring, Murphy was among the 19 women who graduated and landed jobs in their respective fields. She went on to work as a graphic designer for Computer Associates, a Fortune 500 company. She says she owes much of her success to Silverman, and the pair bonded so well that they are starting a Web site-design company together.

A beneficiary agency of The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles, JVS is committed to assisting people of all races and faiths in finding work or redirecting their careers. JVS also works the other side of the fence, helping businesses find qualified employees. With offices in West Hollywood, the San Fernando Valley, and at the Federation’s 6505 Wilshire headquarters, the nonprofit, nonsectarian outreach organization serves more than 7,000 Angelenos each year.

The timing of JVS’s WoMentoring and Winning New Jobs programs couldn’t have arrived at a better time. Dramatic changes have added new work-related stresses and fears that were invisible a scant three years ago. Dot-coms and start-ups are crashing and burning. Brick-and-mortars are laying off employees by the thousands. The Dow Jones industrial average recently plummeted below 10,000 points in its biggest one-week drop in 11 years. The Standard & Poor 500 Index is down 25 percent from its peak last March.

"We are flattening," said Claudia Finkel, JVS’s vice president of programs. "It’s hitting a lot of industries that thought it would never happen to them."

Now that the e-bubble has e-burst, people working for Internet start-ups must update their skills in order to rejoin the corporate world. Also, as Vivian Seigel, CEO and executive vice president of JVS, noted, Congress jettisoned the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s ergonomics rules a few weeks ago, sending a chill throughout the corporate world. With the prospect of two major entertainment strikes looming large this summer, JVS is bracing itself to meet new demand.

Career counselor Bobbi Yanke was instrumental in developing the WoMentoring program and its training infrastructure. She now runs two Valley WoMentoring programs (10 pairs of participants each), including a group focused on small businesses. The professional focus this year includes public relations and journalism; psychology; medical research; television writing; and sales.

"The rewarding aspect has been to watch these women grow and develop and to really take control of their lives," said Yanke, who added that WoMentoring is mutually beneficial. "The mentors help the mentees really become motivated. It’s a cyclical kind of thing. As mentees get inspired, mentors get more inspired."

Silverman attests to this aspect. Her pairing with Murphy was as therapeutic and confidence-building for Silverman as it was for Murphy. "Even people in creative arts have told me that I’m too scattered," Silverman said, "that I have to pick a field." Neither Silverman nor Murphy believed it, she said. "Everything feeds everything else."

Silverman has seen a substantial evolution in Murphy across the year of their exchange.

"In the beginning, she was just really disempowered. She had little notion of being able to support herself, let alone do it as an artist. At the end, we were like, ‘We’re going to be rich!’" Silverman said with a laugh.

They bonded strongly over their shared creative passions and their interest in meditation. In fact, they developed personal mantras to help Murphy gain her confidence, even naming their new graphic design venture CyberShakti (shakti is a Hindu word for the feminine creative force of the universe).

Silverman believed that WoMentoring could use some fine-tuning at the administrative end. She has suggested including a checklist of areas of interest — social skills, interpersonal skills, motivation, confidence issues — on the mentor’s application, to target which areas of growth could be addressed. She even envisioned the concept of a mentee being assisted in different areas by various mentors selected on the basis of this checklist.

"What worked for us," she said, speaking of her relationship with Murphy, "was that we started with the interpersonal stuff. Once you get the interpersonal stuff straight, all the professional stuff works out."

But Silverman’s criticisms do not diminish her affection for the program, which she ultimately found very rewarding and would like to participate in again. "It was very worthwhile," she said.

A program that opened in September 2000, "Winning New Jobs," is another way JVS hopes to help fight unemployment. Many unemployed need to brush up not only on their job skills but on the tools to face the mental health issues that come with the search process. The monthly, five-day "Winning New Jobs" specifically focuses on the psychological aspects of job-seeking, reinforcing positive thinking. After all, even for an employed person, it can be disconcerting to wake up one morning and suddenly realize that age-old corporate bellwethers — such as the 103-year-old Oldsmobile, or Montgomery Ward — have gone the way of the dodo bird.

"’Winning New Jobs’ empowers people to refocus their identities and to realize what they are capable of accomplishing in the workplace," said JVS rehabilitation counselor Brian Ebenkamp. He achieves this through a variety of exercises that allow participants to role-play, assuming both the applicant’s and hiring executive’s perspective. From day one to five days later in this intensive program, Ebenkamp sees a difference.

"It’s like day and night," he said. "They come in thinking they know a lot, but after the workshop they gain a different perspective and the skills to be more effective."

One thing may be certain in this uncertain world, say JVS’s administrators: celebrating its 70th anniversary this year, JVS intends to adapt constantly to the current needs of the marketplace.

"I definitely believe in the WoMentoring program," said mentee Murphy. "It has changed my life for the better in ways that I could never have imagined. I will definitely serve as a mentor someday."

Jewish Vocational Service will hold its Strictly Business L.A. Awards Luncheon on Wed., May 16, 11:30 a.m., at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. S. David Freeman, general manager of Los Angeles Department of Water & Power, will be the keynote speaker. Kaiser Permanente and three JVS employees will be honored. For reservations, call (323) 761-8888, ext. 8895. For more information on Jewish Vocational Service, call (323) 761-8888 or (818) 464-3222 or visit www.jvsla.org.

Finding Work in a Bear Market Read More »

Model Volunteer

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In many ways, 26-year-old Deborah Jennings is typical of the young volunteers at the National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW) in the Fairfax district. She’s a passionate, college-educated individual who volunteers four to eight hours each week for Talkline, a counseling hotline developed by the NCJW’s Women Helping Women Committee. But she’s not Jewish.

Born and raised in Chicago, Jennings received her bachelor’s degree in psychology at Calvin College, a small liberal-arts school in Grand Rapids, Mich., affiliated with the Christian Reformed Church. Jennings followed up with a stint as a youth counselor and programs director at a Chicago church.

So how did Jennings wind up volunteering at a Jewish organization? In October 1999, Jennings had just moved with her husband, a movie sound editor, from Chicago to Los Angeles. With no job waiting, she answered a classified ad for Women Helping Women, which did not mention its parent organization — NCJW.

"I didn’t really know until I got into it that it was a Jewish organization," said Jennings, who is now the Talkline shift leader on Thursday nights. "It took a little getting used to."

"It’s a different faith, but the same moral principles apply," she pointed out, "a commitment to helping others, reaching out. And there’s great support within the organization. I feel very appreciated among the volunteers."

As a Talkline volunteer, Jennings counsels callers — Jewish and not — who phone in with domestic violence, relationship and financial issues. Not all of those seeking help are women; many men have phoned as well.

Jennings said that there are times when the emotions of her work affect her.

"Sometimes you’re on the verge of tears," Jennings said. "Other times really judgmental. When talking to a caller, you really have to suspend your own beliefs and emotions. We call it ‘putting it in a bubble.’"

The rewards of her volunteering have carried Jennings far beyond her NCJW work. Soon after training began, she landed a job at Hathaway Children and Family Services (a facility similar to Vista Del Mar) as a youth counselor. Her NCJW training — which began with a 54-hour course over two months — provided her with skills that gave her an edge over other Hathaway rookies.

"I already knew what they were talking about, and I could draw on my experience," Jennings said. "That makes me feel good. Also in my own life, if my friend has a problem, I can help her as well."

Despite her transition to Hathaway and her enrollment at Cal State Northridge — where she is pursuing her master’s in counseling — Jennings said that she will remain at Talkline. "I have no plans to quit," she said.

"She’s really a dynamic young woman," Lori Karny, director of Women Helping Women, said of Jennings. "I’m really proud of her."

Some might be surprised to learn that Jennings is not so unusual — in fact, there are many non-Jewish volunteers at NCJW.

"We have men who are not Jewish, too," the director said. "People are very attracted to the work and what we do and the mission of improving our community, and they want to find a place where they are comfortable. Some might ask, ‘Do I have to be Jewish to be involved?’ initially, but then they feel very welcome."

So what will volunteers following in Jennings’ footsteps find at NCJW?

"Opportunities," said Karny. "Working on the Talkline, fielding those calls. It’s very enriching to learn about the community you live in and ways that you can help." And Karny added that the only requirements to join are "a desire to help and a willingness to learn."

For more information about volunteering at the National Council of Jewish Women, call (877) 655-3807.

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Sweet Sorrow

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A wall of neatly coiffed ladies charges up to the counter to place their orders for baked goods on one of the last days before the holidays and one of the last days before Brown’s Bakery in North Hollywood closes its doors forever. Some of the customers have been buying their cakes, cookies and bread here for as long as the bakery has been open, and that’s 42 years. Some have been Brown’s customers even longer, when it was Brown Brothers Bakery on Wilshire Boulevard; some for longer still, when Brown’s was in the Bronx, during the war.

Watching this crowd, it’s hard to believe they could possibly purchase their baked goods anywhere else. When Brown’s closes its doors April 15, God only knows what they will do. (In preparation for the bakery’s closing, one customer bought her birthday cake six months in advance and froze it.)

"Things have changed in this area," said Sheldon Brown, the burly, friendly second-generation owner of Brown’s Bakery. "The retail structure of the whole neighborhood has gone downhill. There’s nothing here now."

Looking up and down this stretch of Victory Boulevard, one can see ghosts of a Jewish neighborhood’s past. A dry cleaners, the Ventura Kosher Meat Market and the Circle M Market, all of which used to serve the large Jewish population of 30 years ago, are gone. Now there are only nondescript offices and empty shops. The only other store on the block is a beauty school, which might explain all the nifty do’s but doesn’t generate a lot of customers on this stretch of the Valley.

As far as closing his shop goes, there were other problems besides the neighborhood, Brown said.

"The Health Department told us that no one could walk through from the parking lot [in the rear] to the front of the store," Brown said. "Have you ever tried telling Jewish people they couldn’t walk through? A tank wouldn’t stop them; they’re going to walk here anyway."

Case in point: a stream of elderly ladies marches through the narrow kitchen, looking around at the freshly baked goods, nodding approval, and making their way to the front of the bakery.

"The baker just kissed me," one of the ladies said before disappearing around the corner.

Ten years ago, as the neighborhood went through changes, Brown saw his wholesale business take off as his retail portion began to decline. Brown realized it would be a waste of time and money to remodel.

Even with old customers traveling from all over the Valley to buy, the North Hollywood neighborhood could no longer sustain enough business. Finally, the landlord asked for more rent.

"That was it," Brown said, and decided to get out of retail. After April 15, Brown’s wife, Judy, will become new owner of the wholesale portion of the business. She plans to lease another space and continue to deliver to clients such as Brent’s, Art’s, Bagel Nosh, Billy’s, Roxy’s, Wylers, Robertson Ranch, and a number of other delis and temples and synagogues in the Valley.

"When people heard we were closing down, they began calling: ‘What are we going to do?’ ‘Where are we going to go?’" said Judy, who married Brown shortly after he opened the bakery in 1959. "We’ve gotten hundreds of flowers and notes; I never would have imagined the response. We try and do a good job and have a good product, and [Brown] loves being with customers, but after 42 years, it’s enough."

Enough, however, is not a word Brown’s customers have ever used.

"I am really going to miss this place," said Ruth Crystal of Valley Village. "I’ve been coming here for 56 years. We’re like family." She said she was a customer also when Brown’s was on Wilshire.

"I’m going to cry a lot," said Gladys Horowitz, who travels from Encino. "I’ve been coming since 1960."

"My whole family has been raised on Brown’s products," said Isadore Widre, an elderly gent from Encino who is accustomed to hanging around the kitchen. "I used to send packages up to my daughter when she was in college in San Francisco; I think she paid her way through school with Brown’s strudels and chocolate chip rugelach. Now she’s a successful speech pathologist, and she’s still getting packages from home."

"I moved away from this neighborhood, and I’d come back here to buy and put [baked goods] in the freezer," Joan Stein said. "Now I don’t know what I’m going to do."

"Please put a big caption in your story: We will miss you!" said Magda Hoffman.

"I used to be a customer of theirs in 1941 in the Bronx," said David Berger, an incredibly fit 87-year-old. "I worked on Park Avenue, and I’d buy Brown’s bread and rolls; I’ve been a fan ever since."

"You see what’s going on here," said Brown, standing in the kitchen, listening to his customers’ accolades. "Everyone’s schmoozing; it’s a happening. We’re like one big family."

Unfortunately, like all good things, even bakeries must come to an end, but one wonders how Brown, the preeminent baker of chocolate-chip sponge cake and babkas, who so obviously enjoys the social interaction of his customers, will adjust to not having a bakery. A guy like this must have his hands and back involved in his work and in the neighborhood. But if the neighborhood no longer exists, what does a person like Brown do?

"I can’t really talk about that now," he answered.

Instead, turning to his wife, he said, "Fix her up with a little something, Judy."

That’s a refrain his customers will sadly miss.

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Tuning In

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As founder and chair of Westwood One, the biggest

radio network in the country, Norman J. Pattiz has an impact on what’s carried over the airwaves in the United States and beyond. Now that he is a member of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, he has an even greater voice in international broadcasting.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors oversees the government’s nonmilitary international broadcasting services, including Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Radio Free Asia. Pattiz was appointed to the nine-member board by President Clinton last year. While serving on a committee reviewing the collection of 61 different languages in which programs are broadcast, Pattiz said, “it became obvious that what we were doing in the Middle East was insignificant at best. U.S. broadcasts make little if any impact.”

In other parts of the world people have sought out U.S. broadcasts as a source of unbiased information, Pattiz told The Journal.

“I’ve come to realize the roles these stations have played in places like Kosovo and Bosnia. They were the most listened-to broadcast services in the region during tense times, especially right around the downfall of Milosevic,” he said. “During periods of crisis, people turn them on to find out what’s going on.”

Yet in the Middle East, he estimates that U.S. broadcasts achieve less than 1 percent penetration in the region.

After Pattiz pointed out this deficiency to the Broadcasting Board, he soon found himself chair of its Middle East Committee. He recently embarked on a fact-finding mission that involved meetings with government officials, ministers of information, broadcasters, academics and others in Israel, Jordan, Egypt, the Palestinian Territories and Qatar.

“There’s a media war within the region,” Pattiz said, and it entails disinformation, hate radio and incitement to violence.

As a result of the committee’s work, Voice of America now has an opportunity to make a major impact through a 24-hour broadcasting network. “Broadcasts will originate from the region and truly engage Arab listeners,” Pattiz said, noting that the network will “uniquely present America and its policies with the immediacy and relevance of a local broadcaster.”

Broadcasting accurate, timely and relevant news and information about the region and the United States will advance U.S. strategic interests and benefit all parties in the region, Pattiz says.

Pattiz is no stranger to Middle Eastern politics. He has been an active force in the Israel Policy Forum (IPF), an organization which promotes U.S. awareness and involvement in the Middle East peace process. Becoming involved shortly after the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, Pattiz soon traveled to the Middle East to meet with key Israeli politicians and King Abdullah II of Jordan. He hosts IPF monthly roundtable discussions where prominent community members meet with Israeli leaders, media representatives or other individuals with unique insight about the Middle East.

In 1999, Pattiz was honored by IPF at a tribute dinner where former Prime Minister Ehud Barak presented the award and called Pattiz “an ever-increasingly important conduit of information and good will.” Last spring, Pattiz and his wife hosted a private reception at their home for Queen Noor of Jordan to raise funds for the King Hussein Foundation, which promotes democracy and peace in the Middle East.

Regarding the acceleration of turmoil in the region, Pattiz said, “It’s tragic. [Peace] seemed so close.”

But he’s not ready to give up on the idea.

“Peace is an absolute necessity in the region for all parties…. Nothing has changed about the basics of why the peace has to happen and will eventually happen,” Pattiz said. “What has changed is the realization that while we’ve been preparing ourselves for peace, the Palestinian side has not really worked with its population to get them ready for a real, lasting, achievable peace process.”

Here at home, Pattiz also serves at the state level. He was appointed by Gov. Gray Davis to the California Commission on Building for the 21st Century, which looks at how the state should address building and infrastructure needs such as transportation, natural resources and technology in order to best meet the demands of the future.

“Norm is not just a successful entrepreneur … he’s a committed civic leader,” Davis said. “He’s got great energy and ideas, which he brings to all of his endeavors.”

Pattiz lends his support to the Democratic Party locally and nationally. He attended the Democratic National Convention and hosted a reception for Davis and approximately 200 members of the national press who were covering the convention. Earlier this month, he joined Democratic senators visiting California as part of a national fundraising effort. And last week, he attended a small private dinner for Clinton at the home of supermarket magnate Ron Burkle. A Southern California native, Pattiz, 58, credits his community involvement to his Jewish upbringing.

“My mother’s parents were Orthodox Jews … I have very fond and intense memories of my grandparents. Every Jewish holiday was a day where we would spend time in shul and then spend time at my grandmother’s house, where the family would gather and have a meal together.

“I consider myself a moral person, a caring person, a fair person,” Pattiz added. “And I think all of those things come from my background as a Jew.”

This outlook fuels his philosophy on political activism. “If you’ve been fortunate enough to be successful, [political activism] is almost a requirement,” he said. “I think it’s important if you’re caring and have a point of view, you do what you can to support people and politicians and causes and countries that share those views.”

Pattiz remains loyal to his alma mater, Hamilton High School, and recruited record and music companies to help Hamilton become a magnet school for music and the performing arts. He personally donated funds to transform the school’s auditorium into a marble-and-glass-bedecked theater, which was officially designated the Norman J. Pattiz Concert Hall. Last summer, he spearheaded a gala that raised more than $400,000 for Hamilton’s Academy of Music.

Pattiz has served as president of the

Broadcast Education Association (BEA), where

he sought to connect academia with the broadcast industry to foster student interest in broadcasting careers. He serves as trustee for

the Museum of Television & Radio and the Hollywood Radio and Television Society, as

well as on several university communications boards. He was a force behind last October’s

Los Angeles Radio Festival, a first-time

weeklong event of seminars, broadcasts and special events for the radio community and

the public, which is slated to become an

annual event.

Pattiz approaches his personal life with the same vigor he lavishes on his professional and political activities. He met his wife, Mary Turner, through the radio business. Turner was a disc jockey at local rock station KMET, and Pattiz was looking for someone to host the rock interview show “Off the Record.” Because Turner “knew every major artist in town,” Pattiz said, she was a natural choice.

“I’ve been in the business a long time, so I know sometimes the voice and the image don’t match,” he said about Turner. “When I finally found a woman on the radio who looked as good as she sounded, I married her.” They have been together for 21 years.

At Westwood One, the radio network he founded in 1974 as a one-room operation, Pattiz spends much of his time conceptualizing projects and making deals with artists and recording companies to generate entertainment programs for broadcast. The company has earned a reputation for blockbuster entertainment programming, airing concerts by such megastars as Barbra Streisand, The Rolling Stones, Garth Brooks and Paul McCartney. Last week, it aired Bruce Springsteen’s HBO concert.

Pattiz seems to thrive on the variety of endeavors that has him speaking on the phone to Barbra Streisand and U.S. Senator Evan Bayh on the same day, and a few days later, attending a seder for about 100 people hosted by Maverick Records’ Guy Oseary.

“I’m a very lucky guy,” Pattiz said.

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Dear Rabbi

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Dear Rabbi,

To make it brief: I am married (with a new daughter) to an Israeli American and am a ba’al teshuvah (recently Orthodox). My brother is married to a non-Jew and has a son (1 year old). I love him very much, but we have chosen different career paths and obviously different approaches to religion (he and his wife are raising the child with de facto no religion due to the intermarriage). We have grown increasingly apart from each other, as I have become more observant and he has chosen a different path. He finds it difficult to be with me because Judaism proscribes intermarriage, so he feels as if I view his personal situation as inherently wrong (unfortunately, he is right, although I do my best not to judge him). However, we haven’t discussed our feelings about our growing separation because it is very painful.

Notwithstanding our separateness, I want to maintain a close relationship with him. It seems increasingly difficult considering my religious perspective and his wanting to protect his child from feeling that there is something wrong with him because he is not Jewish. Is there any way to salvage this relationship? Any advice you could provide me would be greatly appreciated.

Yitzhak

Dear Yitzhak,

Thank you for turning to me. Your problem is one shared by many others. As siblings mature, each walks his own path in life, and sometimes those paths are sufficiently divergent that they create strain and even distance between people who love each other. While it is true that you and your brother will not agree on all matters (even those of great importance), that doesn’t have to mean that you can’t love each other, enjoy each other’s company, love each other’s family, and remain a close and connected part of each other’s lives.

But to do so will require great commitment from you both: you must agree to be honest with each other, to remain willing to discuss painful issues, and to respect the integrity and wholeness of each other’s world view even when you cannot agree with aspects of that world view.

You can love your brother’s children whether or not you consider them halachically Jewish. You can give them Jewish gifts to help bring them to a fuller understanding of Torah (from your perspective). Take it from a rabbi, preaching is a poor form of education, so don’t waste your breath. Instead, become a role model of the sweetness and love that Judaism commands us to show each other and all humanity.

Your brother may consider your rules rigid and narrow. That need not prevent him from being with you when you can, and working hard not to perceive your need to observe halacha as meaning that you don’t love him. Some things you will not be able to do together (e.g., Pesach may not be a great time for a lengthy visit), but many things you will, and both of you can enjoy those moments.

Finally, I would encourage both you and your brother to converse not in a spirit of trying to “win” the argument, of trying to persuade each other to abandon views and take on your own (or his). Instead, speak with each other in order to understand each other better and to assist each other in clarifying one’s own views or addressing important topics.

If you and he can learn to express love, to honor differences, and to support each other in being as Jewish and as menschy as possible, you will both have made a contribution to making the world a better place.

God bless you both.

Rabbi Artson

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Postethnic Antisemitism

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Just when we thought it was safe to proclaim the mayoral campaign free from the kind of race-baiting that has tainted previous runs for City Hall, we get this bogus automated telephone message, falsely attributed to Republican candidate Steve Soboroff, attesting to his supposed reliance on "Jewish money."

The reference to this particular canard came at the end of the message, probably because its authors — who at press time have remained unknown, thanks to the dearth of regulations governing telephone campaigning — understood that anyone dumb enough to listen to an automated message in its entirety would also be dumb enough to believe that "the Jewish community" is backing any single candidate.

But then, as Gregory Rodriguez, a senior fellow with the nonpartisan New American Foundation in Washington, suggests, there was no dearth of otherwise politically astute Angelenos quick to blame Jewish interests for an earlier telephone attack directed against Antonio Villaraigosa. "Who would have guessed it came from the Morongo Indian tribe?" he remarked to The Journal.

Probably no one, considering how out of whack the playing of the ethnic card has been in this race. There’s the African American community’s Great White Hope, James Hahn.

Between Xavier Becerra and Antonio Villaraigosa, the Latino candidates, Villaraigosa, if polls are to be believed, enjoys as much standing within the Jewish community as among Latinos. This just goes to show, says tribal observer Joel Kotkin, a senior fellow with a Pepperdine University public policy institute, just how wimpy American Jews are when it comes to holding down the communities that have propelled some of its members to office.

"The only places Jews live in this city," he said, "are where their money allows them. Of course, that was also true, traditionally, of New York." Translated, this means that with the exception of maybe Howard Berman’s congressional seat, Jews simply don’t have that many seats left to lose to the Latino electorate. Jews aren’t running as Jews or voting as Jews, and there aren’t that many "Jewish" districts left up for grabs. So why bother attacking Jews as Jews, unless out of habit?

Soboroff, for his part, appealed mainly to more conservative voters and disaffected Valleyites — most of whom cannot be presumed Jewish — while Wachs’ appeal was to the arts crowd, which hardly sounds like a sure-fire ticket to the upper reaches of City Hall, even if there wasn’t a writers’ strike looming. The fact that the race’s two Jewish candidates openly detest each other (not that there is any love lost between former bosom buddies Villaraigosa and Becerra) only muddies the ethnic waters now coursing in the L.A. River.

Since ethnicity doesn’t seem to be the governing factor in anything, except perhaps the incidental outcome of the winner’s personal background, to understand who might benefit from the phony phone-call smear, you’d think we could look instead at who’s bankrolling the candidates. Except that that makes matters even more confusing.

Villaraigosa gets his backing from the AFL-CIO, wealthy Westsiders, and the Sierra Club. It doesn’t make any sense that his supporters would risk alienating the maybe one-third of the Jewish vote that at the time appeared to be going his way. On the other hand, there may be some residual resentment within some fringe elements of the Latino community against his purported brown-nosing of some Jewish interests and power brokers. But members of this fringe group would launch this kind of attack only if they were desperate, which the polls said they shouldn’t be.

As for Hahn, outside of South Central, no one seems to be fired with enthusiasm for his candidacy. This leads us to ask: What percentage is there for an African American attack against a Jewish candidate on behalf of a white guy, when it is clearly the Latino community that outnumbers every other minority community in Los Angeles, including Caucasians?

And as for the Jewish candidates, Soboroff gets his money from his own back pocket, and maybe some of the pickings from mentor Dick Riordan’s table, while Wachs never raised any serious money to speak of. If this is what the perps of this otherwise pernicious phone ad consider Jewish money, they might do better to recall the old folk tale about the cooks who, upon demanding payment for the tantalizing aroma of their food, were rewarded with the clinking of their prospective clients’ coins.

As a brazen newcomer to urban politics, I am probably wrong when I tell you that this telephone ad strikes me as a red herring, the mewling vestiges of a bygone era that no longer resounds in a city so atomized by class and sprawl that, as of last Monday, many people still had no clue whom to vote for or, for that matter, why they should vote at all.

Up until The Phone Calls, there had been, as Jewish Federation Government Relations Committee Chair Lindsay Conner pointed out, "a delightful lack of ethnic appeals in this campaign." Conner added that people, moreover, didn’t seem to be "using race, ethnicity or religion to make their choices."

On the other hand, what may hold for the first part of this election may not survive the run-off. What started as the cowardly, anonymous idea of a few could turn into a full-fledged campaign strategy, unless Tuesday’s winners make a concerted and public effort to disavow the ethnic card. Otherwise, as a responsible journalist, I have to wager that all bets are off.

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Skirball at Five

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When the Skirball Cultural Center opened in April 1996, its founding president and CEO, Rabbi Uri D. Herscher, didn’t buy the philosophy “If you build it, they will come.”

“My theory was, ‘If they come, then you build,'” the rabbi said. “Prophesy is for fools.”

Not long before the Skirball’s fifth anniversary, Herscher acknowledged that the community response has exceeded his wildest dreams. Fifty thousand visitors were anticipated in 1996; some 300,000 showed up. Half of the adult visitors have been non-Jewish, far more than expected.

Herscher has since taken his own advice: People came, so the center built. At the fifth-anniversary celebration April 21 and 22, Skirball leaders will dedicate Ahmanson Hall, phase two of a massive expansion program.

Located on the north end of the 15-acre campus, the building features an airy, 20,000-square-foot domed hall, Cotsen Auditorium, reminiscent of New York’s Lincoln Center. The auditorium can be transformed from a banquet and conference center to a tiered theater seating up to 515. A wall of floor-to-ceiling windows opens onto a courtyard of pale gray stone and an informal outdoor stage. The $45 million structure, designed by renowned Skirball architect Moshe Safdie, includes a three-floor, subterranean parking garage with 600 spaces.

The hall will allow the Skirball to expand its programs to include “every aspect of literature and the performing arts,” Herscher said. It will also help further the center’s mission to explore “the connections between 4,000 years of Jewish heritage and the vitality of democratic ideals” and to “offer hospitality … to every ethnic and cultural identity in American life.”

“Our goal as an institution is to use the instrument of discovery called culture to bring diverse people together in a safe home,” Herscher told The Journal.

The mission has earned high marks among leaders in the multicultural megalopolis of Los Angeles.

“The Skirball has established itself as a thriving cultural organization within the community,” said Stephanie Barron, a Los Angeles County Museum of Art vice president and chief curator of modern and contemporary art.

“In an amazingly short time, the Skirball has proven to be crucial to the cultural life and health of L.A.,” noted Barry Munitz, president and CEO of the J. Paul Getty Trust, the Skirball’s neighbor in Sepulveda Pass. “Its broad range of programs serves as an adhesive in a city that is physically spread out and ethnically diverse. The Skirball helps to bring people together when the natural momentum of the city is to spread apart.”

When the Skirball quietly opened its doors five years ago, the goal was to host community and arts activities and to provide a new home for the Skirball Museum of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR) — a collection of 25,000 pieces of Jewish art and Judaica previously hidden away in HUC-JIR’s basement. Herscher, HUC-JIR’s former executive vice president, intended the opening to be without fanfare. “I was never quite secure that we would finish it, so I didn’t want to disappoint anyone,” he told the Los Angeles Times in 1995.

But in record time, the institution flourished, drawing national attention for exhibits of prominent Jewish artists such as George Segal and Larry Rivers and a controversial show on Sigmund Freud, among other exhibitions. Angelenos of all types crowded Magnin Auditorium in the main building for lectures, movie screenings, readings, dance recitals and live performances of the L.A. Theatre Works radio series. “Conversations” sold out with famous personalities such as TV giant Norman Lear and playwright Neil Simon.

A concert series inside the center’s Zeidler’s Café grew so popular that it was forced to move outdoors to the Taper Courtyard adjacent to the main building in 1998. Today, the world music, jazz and classical concerts draw some 2,000 people per show.

With the advent of Ahmanson Hall, the large performance events will no longer be seasonally limited to summertime concerts on the courtyard. Dance programs are in the works, and a classical concert series by the L.A. Philharmonic Chamber Players is slated to begin this fall.

But don’t expect art for art’s sake. “The Hebrew word for rabbi is rav, which means teacher,” Herscher said. “So every single event must offer an educational experience.” Herscher envisions youth and family concerts like the ones the late conductor Leonard Bernstein used to host.

Indeed, children have become a crucial target audience for the Skirball, which pays to bus in L.A. Unified School District students weekdays from 9 a.m. to noon. “The field of psychology has taught us that if you want to infuse ideals, you’ve got to start as young as possible,” Herscher explained.

The 30,000 youngsters who visit the Skirball each year learn about Jewish and American values, for example, in two unique gallery “classrooms,” built during the center’s extensive redesign and renovation last year. One of the classrooms depicts a cheder, a Jewish classroom from Eastern Europe; the other suggests a turn-of-the-century American public school.

When the Skirball dedicates its $34 million Winnick Heritage Hall in 2003 — phase three of its building program — the primary focus again will be upon young people. There will be an outdoor amphitheater for the performance of children’s programming. And two 3,500-square-foot children’s galleries will feature a core collection relating the biblical story of Noah’s Ark to multiculturalism today. “It’s the loveliest way to teach children about the immigrant experience,” said Herscher, who hopes the new building will help to bring 20,000 more children to the Skirball each year. “Because every pair of animals is different, it’s perfect to show how we can all get along. It’s a great message for a city like L.A., where people have settled from a variety of cultures around the world.”

While the Skirball is generally lauded as a cultural center, its art exhibits have generated mixed reviews from at least two prominent Los Angeles art critics. “The Skirball has made a big contribution to the total cultural picture of this city, but I don’t think visual art is their strongest suit,” said Suzanne Muchnic, art writer for the Los Angeles Times. “I have yet to be bowled over by an exhibition there.”

“The Skirball has fulfilled its role in [enhancing] the pride and morale of Jewish constituents, but if we’re talking specifically about art-related exhibitions, it hasn’t hit its stride yet,” concurred Edward Goldman, the art critic for National Public Radio. “It seems like they are narrowing their scope to Jewish themes and subjects…. Now that the Skirball has such visibility, and they’ve built up such a prominent space for themselves, I’d like to see them launch a much more ambitious program embracing a much wider range of subjects and themes. That’s what this city needs. I’d like to see something to slightly rock the boat and upset a bit the status quo.”

Herscher said he appreciates the constructive criticism. He noted that the Winnick building will feature an 8,000-square-foot gallery that will provide the necessary space for more ambitious changing exhibitions. It’s hoped that the inaugural show, tentatively scheduled to originate at New York’s prestigious Museum of Natural History, will focus on the life and work of Albert Einstein.

Nevertheless, Herscher insisted, the Skirball’s mandate is to be a cultural center first. “We have an important museum component, but we’re not a museum in the classical sense — we never have been and we never will be,” he said. “When we display art, we have a message about how we can enrich communal life.”

Herscher clearly knows how to enrich communal life, both on a public and personal level. On the second night of Passover, he hosted a seder that read like a Who’s Who of cultural leaders: “He invited me, as well as the presidents of CalTech, USC and the Huntington Library,” Munitz told The Journal. “Some of us are Jewish, some not. It [was] intercultural and interinstitutional work at its absolute best.”

Why does Herscher believe a Jewish institution should further civic life in Los Angeles? “No one people can live in health unless the total community is healthy,” he said. “That is what [the patriarch] Abraham taught us when his first act as Jew was to welcome three strangers to his tent and to give them shelter.”

For information about the Skirball, call (310) 440-4500.

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