Social Action
Kol Haverim strives to be a vibrant, "Social Action" congregation with a focus on sharing time and resources with people in need in our community. The Committee also works to raise awareness about caring for the earth and other issues of Social Justice that impact us nationally and globally. Some families participate in projects together and find this a very enriching experience. Tikkun Olam, healing the world, is the work of our entire Jewish community – be part of it!
For further information on any events or programs or to suggest a new program, contact us at socialaction@kolhaverim.org. We welcome new members at any time - please consider lending your support to our efforts!
Kol Haverim supports Loaves & Fishes Soup Kitchen in Hartford
Glastonbury Free Choice Food Bank
CKH was one of the founding congregations in Glastonbury Links Together, which has partnered with the Town of Glastonbury to open a free choice food bank in the Glastonbury Community Center. Here is the list of items that they need right now: pasta sauce, peanut butter and jelly; cereal; single meals like stew, ravioli, mac & cheese; granola bars; and juices. The food bank will serve families on Tuesday and Thursday by appointment as it gets up and running. If you want to volunteer, the link is: glastonburyct.gov/volunteer.
Backpack Program
The Glastonbury Links Together group also sponsors a backpack program, providing a bag of child-friendly food for kids in need in the Glastonbury Public School System. Volunteers are needed during the school year to deliver the bags of food on Friday mornings, so that the kids have food for the weekend. If you'd like to volunteer, please contact our Temple Administrator, Christine Carlson, at office@kolhaverim.org.
Afghan Refugee Resettlement Support
Kol Haverim’s Social Action Committee has recently joined other local faith based and civic community groups to form an alliance called the River East Resettlement Alliance (RERA), a community of volunteers located in Connecticut (with members from the greater Hartford area east of the river) who have come together for the purpose of supporting an Afghan refugee family to resettle in our area.
RERA is applying to be a co-sponsor group of IRIS (Integrated Refugee & Immigration Services), a CT-based resettlement organization established in 1992. IRIS partners with community groups like ours throughout Connecticut to help refugee families restart their lives in towns across the state. IRIS provides structure and guidance, but each community group is responsible for raising the money and the volunteers to do the work.
Our RERA group will provide support by assisting families with the many challenges they face as they arrive in a new land. This includes helping them acquire housing, healthcare and school enrollment, learn English, obtain employment, learn the public transportation system, and much more. We also assist new families financially during their first year. With this guidance and assistance, a family is empowered to support themselves within a year and become members of their new community. The goal is for families to eventually become US citizens (after 5 years).
We believe that these efforts enrich both the individuals and the communities we serve. Helping the family offers them hope and support which comes back to the community as friendship, gratitude, and an interest in learning about our culture as they teach us about the richness of theirs.To learn more about our group and the opportunity to join this effort, see the RERA website. Questions? Call Steve Avroch at (860) 833-3067 or Seth Molofsky at (860) 214-9147. Thanks for your consideration.
High Holiday Food Drive
Each Yom Kippur, at a time when we purposely deprive ourselves of food, our congregation remembers the many people in our community who are deprived of food for financial reasons. We do this by holding a food drive for our hungry neighbors. This "Food for Families" is distributed through Foodshare, our region’s food bank. Congregants have donated nearly one ton of food annually to Foodshare for people in the Greater Hartford Area. If you are interested in helping to coordinate this food drive next year, contact the Social Action Chairs. The project is easy to organize, and the tangible results are immensely rewarding.
Red Cross Blood Drive
We help the Red Cross as a Blood Drive location on a regular basis. We would like to increase our presence in this life-giving mitzvah by also offering more congregant donors and volunteers to provide food and beverages for donors. Contact us if you would like to help increase our participation.
Global Warming and Environmental Issues
The Social Action/Social Justice Committee offers educational programs and provides information to congregants on global warming, energy conservation, clean and renewable energy, care of the earth and environmental peacemaking. Previous events have included showings of “Kilowatt Ours” and “An Inconvenient Truth,” a sale of compact fluorescent light bulbs, and a lecture by Friends of the Earth Middle East. Some programs are provided in collaboration with Gaining a Greener Glastonbury, an interfaith environmental action and awareness group, and the Interreligious Eco-Justice Network, Connecticut’s Interfaith Power and Light.