A fundraiser for the Louis Brier Home and Hospital is urging community members to make a two-year commitment so the facility can rely on sustainable funding to plan for the future.
“We are asking for people to consider making a commitment for two years so that we can tell the Louis Brier ‘we have raised this much money, we will know that it’s there for two years, you go ahead and make the plan you need to make that will take maybe two years to come to fruition and to give the maximum benefits to your residents,’” said Bernard Pinsky, co-chair of the Sustain, Maintain and Enhance campaign.
The last campaign raised $600,000 in each of three years, Pinsky said, and organizers hope this effort will be at least as successful, if not more. The campaign has been underway for several weeks and culminates at the end of this month. A major celebration – Eight Over Eighty – takes place May 25, when eight individuals and couples will be recognized for lifetimes of dedication to building community.
The campaign is important to the facility, Pinsky said, because the calibre of the home and hospital depends on the support of donors. The Louis Brier does not receive funding from the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver allocations or from United Way, Pinsky said, and the Jewish-specific components of the home’s character are not funded by government allocations.
“In order to make sure that we have the best facilities for seniors in our community the Louis Brier Aged Foundation needs to raise the money to distinguish it from other seniors facilities – many of which are very good, but they do not have the Jewish component,” he said.
Pinsky identified programs and activities such as kosher food, daily services, Shabbat services on Fridays and Saturdays, Yiddish and Hebrew classes, Jewish-themed discussion groups, films, lectures and performances as examples of the type of “extras” the fundraising supports. Louis Brier also has top-notch physiotherapy, art therapy and music therapy programs, he said. The differences made by these services are significant, he added.
“Most people in the Jewish community have had someone connected to them who has been in the Louis Brier and we also know from people who have loved ones, relatives or acquaintances in other facilities that the Louis Brier is a step above in many respects,” said Pinsky. “And we owe it to the people who established this community to give them the kind of dignity and the kind of retirement and life that they would want at this stage of their lives and it’s only us who can help because nobody else will pay for that.”
Harry Lipetz, co-chair of the campaign with Pinsky, emphasized the Louis Brier’s dependence on the generosity of the community. “The Louis Brier Home and Hospital doesn’t have memberships such as synagogues [do] to draw upon,” said Lipetz, who is also president of the Louis Brier Jewish Aged Foundation. “We simply rely on the entire Jewish community.”
Lipetz said the Louis Brier’s reputation is due to the resources provided by community support. “The level of care that’s provided is probably rated the highest in British Columbia due to the additional funding that the foundation provides annually,” he said. “I am satisfied that our efforts really do bring quality of life to people, as we say, ‘adding life to years and years to life’ is something we are accomplishing.”
Lipetz asks people to take the initiative to support the campaign. “We have a limited ability to reach out to individuals,” he said. “It is a relatively large Jewish community. We would hope that individuals would come forward whether they are contacted or not to support this campaign.”
Pat Johnson is a Vancouver writer and principal in PRsuasiveMedia.com.