By Donna Gordon Blankinship, Editor, JTNews
Remember the gym teacher who talked you into jumping off the high dive even though you were afraid? He works at the Stroum Jewish Community Center now, where he’s inspiring the staff and volunteers to reach new heights.
Barry Sohn took over as director of the JCC in June, with enthusiasm, determination, a firm handshake and plenty of creative notions about how to get things done.
He says he has two kinds of tasks before him — short-term efforts to fix things like security and locker room aesthetics along with long-term goals concerning the future of the JCC and its economic stability.
Sohn will gladly read you a list of his goals, but he is not ready to volunteer a vision for the JCC.
“One of the things I said early on is that people will ask me what’s my vision for the J and I’ll answer very honestly: I don’t have one yet,” he says. “We’re just going to do things and out of doing things a vision will come.”
Fresh ideas and enthusiasm will go a long way toward turning goals into visions, if Sohn has his way, although he is also looking toward his board of directors and other community leaders to help formulate this vision over time.
“We’ve got to get past the point of ringing our hands over everything that has happened,” and move on, Sohn says.
The most popular reason to ring your hands about the JCC has been its financial instability. A combined effort by the JCC Board, an interim director and by Sohn himself has resolved some of these issues. They have employed a variety of measures, including closing two preschools, laying off staff and beefing up recruitment of students for the Mercer Island preschool.
“One June 18, I started work. About two days later my controller handed me the budget beginning July 1… showing an operating deficit of over $270,000,” Sohn says. “Clearly one of the big issues in my first few weeks was to get things back in line.”
He says he and the JCC staff found ways to meet that challenge — by cutting administrative expenses and maximizing enrollment goals — and now they are ready to focus on other issues. Much of the credit for the budget fix goes to the Early Childhood Services department, which added $125,000 in revenue for the fiscal year.
“We need to create the kind of fiscal credibility … that the JCC has not had in the last few years,” Sohn says. “We will have a balanced budget this year, hopefully without a lot of pain.”
Increased membership and more fee income are too areas Sohn has identified as targets for improving the JCC’s fiscal picture. “I believe we make it too easy for non-members to access our services,” he says, adding that they also want to make membership more attractive by adding value.
Sohn came to the Stoum JCC from running the JCC in Akron Ohio — from a Jewish community of about 4,000 to one of about 40,000. But the two JCCs have around the same number of members units. “Clearly there is room to grow the number of members we have at the J. We just have to created the reason,” he says. “The facility is tired…. It’s a great facility and we offer great programs but it needs to be fixed up.”
Sohn served nine years as executive director of the Akron JCC. He has worked for 24 years as a full-time JCC professional, not including his summers as a camp counselor. He and his wife, Laura, their children and their yellow Labrador retriever left Akron in early June.
Another top priority that could also build JCC membership is enhancing services in the Northend — where a third of the Jews in greater Seattle live. “We are investing energy in the Northend that hasn’t been invested in a long time,” he says. Sohn has been spending part of one day each week at the Northend JCC, meeting with people and getting a feeling for the issues. “I believe that the J has to be a more prominent player in the Northend,” he says.
Sohn adds, however, that new or enhanced services in the Northend should not be automatically interpreted as new buildings. He is a strong believer in the concept of a JCC without walls. There are venues the JCC can rent — such as school gyms and pools for after-school programs and aerobics classes — and partnerships the agency can pursue. “We have to be more entrepreneurial, more needs based, up at the Northend,” he says, adding that his first job out of graduate school was at a JCC without walls.
All proposed new programs — anywhere within the Stroum JCC structure — will be judged using three criteria: how scores as a source of revenue, a driver of membership and its relationship to the JCC mission.
For example, if a program does not generate membership and isn’t self-sustaining from a financial perspective, “it had better be very mission-based,” Sohn explains. He believes creating a balance of these three criteria will lead to building a financially stable JCC.
Sohn is also big on finding community partners to improve the JCC’s programs. “I don’t believe that we do everything better than everyone else. We would benefit from strategic partnerships with other Jewish communal agencies,” he says, adding that they have already begun to discuss joint projects with Jewish Family Service.
“I am not territorial by nature. I don’t need the J to take credit for everything. I need the J to be the best it can be,” Sohn adds.
He says one of the JCC’s most valuable assets is its great staff. “I have been amazed at how well the staff has embraced new ideas,” he says.
One potential JCC development — one with walls — that is on the minds of many community members is the proposal to build a community campus on JCC property on Mercer Island. No decisions have been made whether to move forward with this project, but Sohn expects the committees discussing this project will make some decisions soon.
To give Sohn your two cents about the future of the JCC, attend one of the “town hall” meetings he has set up for the near future. The next “town hall” meeting at the Northend JCC will be Monday, Sept. 30, at 7 p.m. The next “town hall” meeting at the Mercer Island facility will be Oct. 8, at 7:30 p.m.