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Anita Friedman, executive director of Jewish Family and Children's Services in San Francisco, has been elected president of the city's Congregation Sherith Israel, becoming what may be the first head of a Jewish agency to simultaneously serve as top volunteer at a synagogue.

But the 43-year-old Friedman, who replaces former president Margaret Kaufman, is quick to downplay the distinction of her new double duty.

"The truth is there are many people in the community who are very committed both professionally and as volunteers to Jewish institutions," she says. "Many people see being involved Jewishly as a lifestyle."

Friedman, a San Francisco resident and member of Sherith Israel for eight years, believes her duties at the 1,300-family Reform synagogue will dovetail perfectly with those at JFCS, where she has served as executive director since 1984.

"I believe meeting the spiritual and Jewish education needs of the families in our community is as important as meeting their social service needs," she says. "To me, this is the flip side of the same coin."

The only child of Holocaust survivors, Friedman also serves as vice president of the American Jewish Congress and is involved with San Francisco's Town School for Boys, which her children attend.

She admits she already had a full schedule before she signed on for two one-year terms as Sherith Israel's president. But she is encouraged by support from the synagogue's rabbis and her fellow board members.

She took the role on, she says, because she feels synagogues are at an exciting historical crossroads.

"For several decades at least, synagogues were not seen as major institutions in Jewish life. They were seen as sleepy little institutions," says Friedman, who last month received a Koret Prize for her leadership. "This is the time for synagogues to really emerge as the leading institutions in Jewish life."

Synagogues, she adds, "have the ability not only to serve Jews, but to create Jews."

Other Sherith Israel officers elected at a May 6 annual meeting include Donald Friend as vice president, Dr. Marina Tikhman as secretary and Robert Voss as treasurer.