The Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund has granted $3 million to the Institute on Aging at Mount Zion Hospital, nearly doub-ling the San Francisco nonprofit’s endowment.
The institute, renamed the Goldman Institute on Aging earlier this year, provides day health care and social programs to Alzheimer’s patients and other seniors, support for homebound elders, medical and mental health services and health education programs for seniors and their families.
As such factors as improved health care lead to an expanding population of seniors, the Goldmans’ gift will help the IOA augment its services and counteract cutbacks in government funding, said Dr. Lawrence Feigenbaum, founding director of the IOA.
The Goldman Fund is expected to award some $9 million total in 1996, according to Duane Silverstein, executive director of the fund.
The IOA gift will support free community health programs, Feigenbaum said, as well as “research to help us determine what are the things we and others do to make a difference in the lives of the elderly.”
The IOA was formally established and incorporated in 1985 by Mount Zion Medical Center, which has offered services to the elderly for years. Roughly one-third of the institute’s clients are Russian Jewish emigres.
Richard Goldman, president and chief executive officer of an independent insurance brokerage firm in San Francisco, was, with his late wife, Rhoda, involved in IOA from its inception.
“Rhoda encouraged our involvement initially and now my family and our fund are committed to continuing to serve the senior community,” said Goldman, a longtime Jewish philanthropist and member of San Francisco’s Congregation Emanu-El.
Rabbi Stephen Pearce, spiritual leader of the congregation, said the Goldman Fund gift reflects one of Judaism’s most crucial precepts.
“Part of the Jewish mandate is to care for our parents; one of the commandments is to honor thy mother and thy father,” Pearce said.
“What more wonderful way to do that than to care for people at the point of their lives that they’re not able to take care of themselves?”
The Goldman Fund, in fact, supports the elderly through various avenues. Grant recipients last year included Alzheimer’s Services of the East Bay, Bayview Hunter’s Point Network for Elders and Tenderloin Senior Organizing Project.
Also in 1995, as in years past, the Goldman Fund granted $75,000 to the Jewish Home for the Aged in San Francisco.
But of the senior-related grantees, the IOA has by far received the largest sum. “We responded to an innovative program,” Goldman said.
Among the IOA’s services is one that picks up homebound seniors in the morning and brings them to the Geary Street center for a day of socializing. They learn the news from TV and newspapers in Russian, Chinese and English. Social workers then lead a group discussion on the issues.
Later, the seniors eat lunch together and participate in group exercise and such activities as card games, lectures and bingo.
Last year, the IOA, in association with the UCSF Mount Zion Center on Aging — with which the institute is affiliated — served more than 10,000 people.
“I think the proof is in the pudding,” Goldman said. “All you have to do is look at the number of people they provide service to daily.”
To honor the memory of Rhoda Goldman — who died of a heart attack in February — and to recognize the family’s support of the institute, the center was renamed in July. Feigenbaum stressed that the name change was unrelated to the $3 million gift, which came later.
“If it hadn’t been for Rhoda at the outset, I don’t think we would have an institute on aging,” he said. “We have had many supporters, but [the Goldmans] have clearly been the most significant.”
The Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund, established in 1951, has over the years supported a range of causes, including the environment, youth and education, the arts and civic and Jewish affairs.
Jewish organizations received some $7 million in grants from the Goldman Fund in 1995. Recipients included the Hebrew Union College, Jewish Museum San Francisco, New Israel Fund, Jewish Community Federation and Jewish Community Relations Council.