Hopefully you’ve noticed some changes taking place at Temple Emanuel this summer. Last month
I wrote about the projects involving the base-
ment of the TE House and the fire landings. As stated in last month’s Shofar, those projects were paid for out of our budget.
In August, both the House and Sanctuary underwent a thorough cleaning. Vinyl floors, carpets, walls, and even ceilings have been thoroughly cleaned. The Sanctuary kitchen has likewise been cleaned, a process that even involved the moving of appliances so that all dirt could be reached. This extensive cleaning was done without the use of Temple Emanuel funds—our Treasurer Howard Schachter, along with Jon Zonderman and Bruce Spiewak, discovered that puff backs that occurred in the past were responsible for the damage and that we were still entitled to file a claim with our insurer. The insurer is still evaluating our claim, but has approved and paid for the cleaning.
Another room has been freed upstairs in the house. As many of you are aware, the Youth Group did fine work in creating and painting a Youth Lounge. Now we have another open room upstairs opposite the Rabbi’s Office. This room was formally used as the caretaker’s apartment and now can
be used as a library. Risé Siegel and Melissa Perkal have spent many hours cleaning, removing wallpaper, scraping paint, and then repainting. Jean Silk sorted through the many randomly stored boxes there and properly filed some and discarded those that were not necessary. Many of the saved documents contain a fascinating history of Temple Emanuel, but more on that another time.
Not all change is manifested in the physical. We are also in the process of improving our methods of communicating with the congregation. Jean started this process at the beginning of the year. It involves the sending of electronic newsletters through Constant Contact. These will supple- ment the Shofar which will still come out in print. Arlene Cohen, Marc Webber and Jen Poulsen have been doing a great job on this and we should be seeing the results of their labor shortly.