Jewish Family Service Opens a New Center Providing a Unique Approach to Help People in Need
Cincinnati, OH (PRWEB) December 20, 2013 -- The greater Cincinnati community is now benefiting from a unique holistic approach to help families experiencing poverty, hunger and mental illness. Jewish Family Service promotes wellness and stability for its clients by combining a food pantry, case management, and peer-based socialization activities under one roof at its new comprehensive Barbash Family Vital Support Center.
The Barbash Family Vital Support Center is Jewish Family Service’s realization of the dream to address the full spectrum of hardships that accompany hunger and poverty - homelessness, fear, isolation, stress, and despair.
It is located in newly renovated space on the campus of Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion in Clifton. The Vital Support Center is the only place in the community that addresses the unique needs of people experiencing financial difficulties or mental illness who desire to be served within a Jewish cultural setting. For example, Jewish Family Service clients can enjoy Jewish holiday themed parties, rabbinic connection, and support and guidance within the context of their Jewish spiritual needs.
As a best-practice and evidence-based program, the peer-based program promotes self-sufficiency by encouraging clients to form relationships with each other. This allows people that once might have felt isolated the ability to feel connected with their community members and live meaningful lives again.
Private client rooms provide a comfortable and safe environment for Jewish Family Service case managers to meet confidentially with individuals. Case management plays a key role in helping clients attain self-sufficiency by providing emergency financial aid, housing assistance, supportive counseling, and assistance in accessing government and private program funding.
Jewish Family Service opened its first food pantry ten years ago in the basement of Golf Manor Synagogue. Over the years, demand grew from serving a couple dozen people in need to 450 across Greater Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky, and Indiana. Today, the expanded food pantry in the new Vital Support Center is open to Jewish Family Service clients in nearly 50 zip codes as well as all people in need who live in Cincinnati's 45220 zip code. It is the only food pantry in the region that also includes a section with a full array of kosher foods and meat.
Jewish Family Service welcomes community involvement from volunteers and social action groups. Volunteers can help with collecting and sorting food at the pantry, delivering food to isolated families, share a special talent or skill with clients, or organize holiday festivities for clients.
The Jewish Family Service Barbash Family Vital Support Center is now able to help the most vulnerable in the community thanks to generous donations from the Health Foundation of Greater Cincinnati (now called Interact for Health), The Jewish Foundation of Cincinnati, the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati, The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, Inc., the Bernard and Pam Barbash family, the George and Anne Heldman family, and many other individual donors.
Jewish Family Service of the Cincinnati area is a 501(c)3 nonprofit social services agency that strengthens lives and our community by providing professional social services to families and individuals in times of need through Adoption, Aging & Caregiver Services, Family Life Education, and Vital Services Support. Learn more at http://www.jfscinti.org.
Sherry Kaplan, Jewish Family Service Cincinnati, http://www.jfscinti.org, +1 513-766-3322, [email protected]
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