Debbie Brant and Dr. Robert Kahn
Submitted by The Jewish Foundation
The Jewish Foundation of Cincinnati held its 29th Annual Meeting last week at the Mayerson JCC. This year’s gathering was open to the public as usual but was billed as a conversation with the Foundation’s grantees.
In an interactive program featuring a brief presentation by the Foundation’s CEO Brian Jaffee, with remarks by Board Chairperson Walter Solomon and Chief Program Officer Danniell Nadiv, the Foundation summarized its grantmaking activity and outlined several challenges and opportunities it expected to address in the year ahead.
The Foundation also took the opportunity to publicly thank three outgoing Trustees — former Board Chairperson John Stein, Arna Poupko Fisher and Gloria Lipson — and announced the election of two new Trustees: Debbie Brant and Dr. Robert Kahn.
“Our Mission is to strengthen Jewish Life in Greater Cincinnati now and for generations to come,” said Jaffee. “We wanted to use our Annual Meeting for dialogue with our grantee partners acknowledging the impact of their work today, and to also focus on what it will take for us to continue supporting community needs well into the future.”
One of the initiatives showcased at the Foundation’s Annual Meeting was a new Community Planning effort being led by the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati, with grant funding from the Foundation. The importance of community planning came up several times during the formal remarks as well as in the Q&A, and the Foundation leadership reinforced the intention for this to be a community-wide effort, with input from leadership of Jewish organizations throughout the community.
Foundation Secretary and Governance Committee Member Dr. Rachel Faust shared appreciation for the three outgoing trustees, and made the first public announcement about the election of Ms. Brant and Dr. Kahn. Debbie Brant has served for many years in the Cincinnati Jewish Community, most recently as President of the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati Board (where she was also a Volunteer of the Year Award winner). She is also a past Board Chair of the Mayerson JCC. Beyond the Jewish community, Ms. Brant chaired the board of Most Valuable Kids of Cincinnati and is a past recipient of the Cincinnati Enquirer’s Women of the Year Award. She is currently the CEO of the Cincinnati Ballet, having led that organization’s recent capital campaign and transition to new headquarters.
“I am honored to join the Board of the Jewish Foundation of Cincinnati,” said Brant. “I have long admired the work done by the Board and Staff of the Foundation and look forward to continuing to expanding the Foundation’s impact on our community.”
Dr. Robert Kahn is a general pediatrician and child health researcher who leads the Michael Fisher Child Health Equity Center at Cincinnati Children’s. As a public health expert whose interest lies at the intersection of poverty and child health, Dr. Kahn brings significant experience in identifying challenges and using data-based approaches to solving them. Among his many roles in community service, Dr. Kahn has been a Leaders in Light Fellow through the Jewish Federation and JCRC of Cincinnati, was the lead consultant for Jewish Family Service’s Steering Committee on Youth, Teen & Young Adult Mental Health, and has been a member of Adath Israel Congregation and the Mayerson JCC for 25 years.
Said Dr. Kahn: “I feel incredibly privileged to be invited to serve on the Jewish Foundation Board. Cincinnati’s Jewish community welcomed us 25 years ago in so many meaningful ways and enabled us to raise three kids who now all live their Jewish values everyday as young adults. I look forward to giving something back to the community, especially given these difficult times, through my role as a trustee.”
Commenting on the leadership succession, Walter Solomon said, “The Foundation, and by extension our entire community, owes John, Arna and Gloria a tremendous debt of gratitude for their service as trustees, and we will miss them on the board. We are thrilled with the caliber of our two newest trustees — each of whom demonstrate the type of leadership qualities we need around our board table. They bring people together, surface tough issues and take them head on, and use the right combination of data and relationship-based approaches to solve problems.”
Wrapping up its annual meeting, the Foundation made several commitments to its grantee partners, including offers to meet with boards and professional leadership for more conversations about measurement and evaluation, and mutual expectations. “This year’s annual meeting was a good way to continue hearing from and engaging with our partners to maximize the effectiveness of our work together,” said Jaffee. “We look forward to another year ahead as we rededicate ourselves to investing in our community.”
