Volunteers for the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation raised $2.2 million during last week’s Super Sunday phonathon, as more than 6,500 donors reaffirmed their support of the JCF’s annual campaign.
This year, pledges increased an average of 7.9 percent over a year ago.
Seth Moskowitz, the JCF’s campaign director, said the total does not include pledges raised through the federation’s pre-Super Sunday mail appeal.
“Those pledges will take us well over $3 million, when all is said and done,” he said.
According to campaign chair Carol Saal, the large number of increases set the tone for a positive drive.
San Francisco Super Sunday chair Karyn DiGiorgio and vice-chair Josh Smith said they were pleased with the results of the Bay Area Jewish community’s largest one-day fund-raising effort.
The money raised during the 12-hour phonathon will become part of more than $19 million raised and allocated to 60 Jewish agencies and programs locally, in Israel and elsewhere overseas, they said.
In keeping with the JCF’s 86-year tradition of helping Jews in need, nearly 1,000 volunteers at the Grand Hyatt hotel in San Francisco and the Albert L. Schultz Jewish Community Center in Palo Alto telephoned some 10,000 fellow Jews to seek funds.
At Super Sunday headquarters in the city, volunteers worked amidst art projects prepared by students in area Jewish schools and based on the JCF’s campaign theme of “A Lasting Tradition in a Changing World.”
Maintaining the tradition of volunteering at Super Sunday is a priority for the Barkoff family. The Hillsborough residents arrived at Super Sunday headquarters before the phones even opened and stayed until the last of the calls had been made.
“My father [Harvey Carter] used to be known as Mr. Super Sunday. When he passed away I decided it was up to me to keep the tradition going and we’ve been coming ever since,” said Marcia Barkoff.
Her husband, Steve, led advanced training sessions, while her two sons (Michael, 11, and David, 10) served as “runners,” assisting adult volunteers and making sure they had plenty of hot buttered popcorn and other goodies.
Meanwhile, at the packed phone bank titled New Americans, Russian-speaking volunteers solicited fellow newcomers. Assisting them was Luke Howitt, who works as an administrative assistant for the San Francisco Jewish Community Center’s emigre department.
“This is my first Super Sunday,” said an enthusiastic Howitt, who was born in England, studied Russian in Kiev and lived on a kibbutz in Israel before relocating here.
Howitt, who is not Jewish, told the story of how his grandparents helped a dozen Czechoslovakian children obtain English visas to escape Hitler’s persecution.
“The survivors, who were placed with English families, are now in their sixties, but to this day my 85-year-old grandmother still keeps in touch with them and fondly refers to them as her Czech children,” he said.
On the Peninsula, co-chairs Anne Steirman and Anita Rosen said they were thrilled to see 10 new phones in use during the Super Sunday morning shift.
During the second shift, Rabbi Yosef Levin, of Chabad of the Greater South Bay, called a prospective donor who said he couldn’t talk because he was immersed in the 49ers game.
After the game was over and the `Niners had beaten the Washington Redskins in overtime, Levin called the football fan back with a hearty, “Mazel tov — and wouldn’t you like to increase your gift?”
The happy fan made a $300 increase.
Longtime Peninsula resident and Jewish community leader Dick Sirinsky said almost all the people he called pledged to give larger amounts than they had before.
Like 150 other volunteers who had been giving to the federation for 25 years, Sirinsky wore a blue ribbon designating him as a JCF “Quarter Century Circle” donor.
In both San Francisco and the South Peninsula, representatives from the Amuta, the JCF’s volunteer advisory board in Israel, were on hand to discuss campaign-funded projects in Kiryat Shmona, the JCF’s partner town in Israel’s Upper Galilee.
In San Francisco, volunteers working the Young Adults Division phone bank were motivated by megaphones, noisemakers and flashing lights shaped like dreidels.
Many felt motivated by the success of 11-year-old volunteer Jason Bernstein, a first-time caller and campaign contributor who raised more than $10,000, including $3,000 in just one gift. Sporting a Camp Tawonga sweatshirt, the San Francisco youngster noted that at one point, having spent several hours working at Super Sunday, “My mom was ready to leave. But I convinced her we should stay `til the end.”