Dear Temple Emanuel Community,

At last year’s annual meeting and during our High Holy Day appeal, we shared the financial challenges facing our congregation. We explained that we rely mainly on annual membership dues, rental fees, and fundraising to support our expenses, including member services, programming, staff salaries and benefits, and building maintenance. Balancing income and expenses has always required effort, but the past few years have been especially difficult in the wake of the pandemic, as affiliation across religious institutions has continued to shift.

Budget Update

Since we finished the fiscal year 2023-2024 with a deficit, the bank that holds our mortgage has stipulated that we must have a balanced budget by the end of this fiscal year 2024-2025. The bank has been lenient with us for the last few years as we recovered from losses during the pandemic. However, this year we have only one acceptable option – to achieve a balanced budget. If we are unsuccessful, the bank will convert our current mortgage to a one-year note, interest-only at a much higher rate than we have currently. This would result in either our organization needing to pay off the mortgage or a refinancing scenario, which would increase our financial obligation and burden.

The Board of Trustees, staff, and Financial Committee have been closely managing the budget all year. We've carefully reviewed expenses, made reductions where possible, and evaluated income sources with a focus on meeting congregant and staffing needs and an eye on reaching our budget target. The Board of Trustees takes our fiduciary role very seriously. We are constantly working to improve our financial stability while providing congregants with the services they expect. When we meet our budget goal, our focus will shift to ensuring a strong budget for next year and many years to come.

Our membership is now stable, and we are grateful that our Financial Assistance allocations are lower than they’ve been in several years. This leaves us to focus on increasing our fundraising dollars. We appreciate how the congregation stepped up to support Temple Emanuel with generous High Holiday pledges. To complete our annual fundraising goal and reach a balanced budget, we must raise an additional $60,000.

How Can You Support?

This is where our spring fundraiser comes in! By now you’ve heard about our exciting Spring Raffle. Perhaps you’ve already bought tickets. The lucky winner will spend a week at a luxurious 3-bed, 3-bath, 3,400 sq. ft. villa in Maui right by the beach! This is no ordinary fundraiser. We must reach our sales goal to balance our budget for this fiscal year. To date we are over a quarter of the way there at over $19,000!

We can get there by selling 600 raffle tickets by May 10th at Hula and Havdalah, where the winner’s name will be drawn (no need to be present to win). Be on the look out for information soon!

Here’s how you can help.

Buy tickets for yourself, your family and friends.

• Share the raffle information with others.

• If you’re even a little competitive, become a Temple Emanuel Champion. It’s a friendly competition to see who can sell the most tickets. Email Raffle Chair Erica Shapiro at eriree@yahoo.com for all the Champion tools.



Rabbi & Managing Director Update

The Rabbi Search Committee has finished the last of our onsite visits and is looking forward to making a recommendation soon. Per our bylaws, the Search Committee’s recommendation will be presented to the Board of Trustees and then brought to the congregation for a community vote during a special session. We will share the meeting date and additional details in early May, allowing our community to review and vote on the recommendation.

Rabbi Jonathan Biatch has been a wonderful leader this year, and we hope you have had an opportunity to engage with him. We are deeply grateful to Rabbi Jonathan for his guidance and care during this interim year. His presence has made a lasting impact, and we look forward to honoring his contributions with upcoming opportunities to come together as a community and wish him well in his next chapter.

Given the need to prioritize the rabbinic search, we’ve temporarily paused the Managing Director search. Now that we’re nearing a decision on the next Rabbi, we’re in a stronger position to refocus our efforts on finding the right candidate for this critical role, while also giving the new Rabbi a voice in the process.

We want to extend our heartfelt thanks to Jennifer LeGrand, who has generously stepped in as a full-time interim Managing Director during this time of need. Jennifer has taken on the day-to-day operations with incredible dedication, and we are deeply grateful for her leadership, flexibility, and unwavering commitment to our community. She has let us know she is willing to continue serving in this capacity until we find the right long-term candidate, and we cannot thank her enough.

If you have questions or comments, please contact either of us. We are so appreciative of your continued support of Temple Emanuel of Tempe. We will update you on our raffle over the next few weeks and will share more at our Annual Gathering on Thursday, May 29th at 7:00 pm. Information on how to RSVP for the annual meeting will be available in the near future.

Arnold Bedak, President

arnoldbedak@gmail.com

Lynn Plait, Vice President of Finance

lynnplait@gmail.com