Who We Are
JCAL, the Jewish Community Alliance of Lancaster, is the collection of Jewish organizations in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Working with the Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA), JCAL supports Jewish life in Lancaster, in Israel and all around the world.
In Lancaster, we help our students go to Jewish summer camp, Israel, and other immersive Jewish experiences. We host a community lighting of our Red Rose menorah in Penn Square each night of Chanukah and commemorate Yom HaShaoh, honoring local survivors and their descendants. Lancaster's religious school students go on a field trip every year, funded by JCAL. Authors from around the world come to Lancaster (via Zoom) as part of our Writers In Residences* (*theirs and ours) program
In Israel and everywhere in the world Jews live, JCAL partners with JFNA, the Jewish Agency for Israel and the American Joint Distribution Committee to assist Holocaust survivors in Israel living in poverty, help Jews living in war zones, and bring Israeli Shlichim (emissaries) to Lancaster, American summer camps and other Jewish communities to educate everyone about real life in Israel.
Our Mission
The mission of the Jewish Community Alliance of Lancaster (JCAL) is to enhance and promote Jewish life, identity, and continuity locally, in Israel and throughout the world; and to generate the financial resources to develop, provide and support diverse programs, education and services in order to accomplish these goals for our entire community.
Leadership
Officers:
President: Joshua D. Cohen
Vice-President: Samara Sofian
Treasurer: Sharon Wolman
Secretary: Alan Randall
Immediate Past President: Miriam Baumgartner
Community Trustees:
Chabad of Lancaster:
Congregation Degel Israel: Eliyahu Richelson
Congregation Shaarai Shomayim: Cynthia Lengeman
Jewish Family Service of Lancaster: Tama Etra
Temple Beth El: H. Diane Penchansky
Ex-officio Members of the Board:
Cantor Carol Chesler (Temple Beth El)
Rabbi Elazar Green (Rohr Chabad Jewish Center)
Dr. Victoria Khiterer (Millersville University Hillel)
Rabbi Avrohom Notis (Degel Israel)
Rabbi Jack Paskoff (Congregation Shaarai Shomayim)
Rachel Singer (Hillel/Klehr Center at Franklin & Marshall College)
