Young Nathalie Tucker holds up the flyer for Super Sunday ’09, accompanied by her parents, event chairs Suzanne and Rob Tucker, seated on either side of her, and members of the committee and federation staffers.
Photo by Elaine Durbach
August 14, 2008
The Jewish Federation of Central New Jersey announced plans for its biggest fund-raiser of 2009 — and happily explained why it will take place in 2008.
Opening the first meeting of the planning committee for the annual Super Sunday 2009 phonathon was Suzanne Albin Tucker, who told the Aug. 5 gathering that the fund-raiser was scheduled for Dec. 7, 2008.
Tucker, who is cochairing the event with her husband, Rob Tucker, explained that the December date is thanks to an experimental link-up between Central and five other federations around the state. For the first time, they have all agreed to hold their Super Sunday fund-raisers on the same day and to pool resources to maximize publicity, cut outreach costs, and hopefully boost donations.
They are also sharing the theme: “Super Sunday 2009: one people-one day-one community.”
Super Sunday 2008, held this past Jan. 27, brought in around $600,000. The organizers are hoping to top that with the December event — a tough challenge given the state of the economy, and all the more reason to hold down costs. The money usually accounts for about 10 percent of the federation’s annual campaign total.
The first evidence of the new collaboration is the blue and green flyer produced for the day. Lillah Nussbaum, the federation’s events manager and point person for Super Sunday, passed the draft copy around. The participating federations have agreed on the basic design, but — as with other aspects of the day — they have leeway to individualize it. The Central organizers have suggested adding their own element — a chain of figures in the foreground, all holding hands.
The 20 or so people at the meeting greeted the design with unanimous approval. That harmony prevailed throughout, a fact welcomed by the Tuckers and co-vice chairs Shari Bloomberg and Mara Levy.
The pleasure of organizing the mega fund-raiser seems to attract returnees. Everyone there — including the Tuckers’ eight-year-old daughter, Nathalie, who helped hand out materials — has been involved before, many as chairs of the event. Even the high schoolers in attendance, Matt Simon and siblings Kapri and David Krebs, already have a track record. Asked what made them decide to help again, Kapri simply said, “We enjoy it and it feels good.”
The new federation president, Gerry Cantor, joined the meeting for a while. He said, “This is a unique time to get young people involved. If you can reach them on Facebook or some other way, they will connect with people in numbers we at federation can’t touch. And if they come to Super Sunday, they’ll get addicted to it — to that same excitement that I got when I did it for the first time.”
Cantor related his favorite Super Sunday memory — of the time he and his wife, Dorothy, brought with them to the event a family of Soviet immigrants who had arrived just a few days before. The husband had all the money he possessed folded in the breast pocket of his shirt. When he realized what the volunteers were raising funds for, he insisted on making a donation from that precious stash. “I’m getting tears just thinking about it,” Cantor said.
Luba Vigdorchik listened to his story, nodding her head. She and her husband arrived from Moldova 18 years ago, in that same influx from the Soviet Union. “That is just how it was for us,” she said. “Without the help we were given, we could not have survived. That’s why I’ve been helping with Super Sunday ever since we came,” she said.
Given that Dec. 7 falls just before Hanukka, this year Super Sunday will offer various new possibilities. There will be a toy drive to benefit child clients of Jewish Family Service of Central NJ and a book drive to benefit schools in Linden served by JFS.
An array of vendors will be on hand — offering gift-buying opportunities for the holiday and ways to benefit federation at the same time. They will probably be housed in the same room as the food service. That idea pleased Joel Horowitz, who has handled the culinary side of Super Sunday year after year. “Shopping and food always go together,” he said. “We’ll be like the food court at the mall.”
In an e-mail written after the meeting, Suzanne Tucker said, “We want and need the members of our community, not only to answer the phone on Super Sunday (which of course, we do), but to get involved in the planning of Super Sunday now. We are open to everyone, there is a need for everyone’s ideas and enthusiasm, and we really feel that everyone has something valuable that they can contribute.
“There is no better way to learn about why we ask for money than to see behind the scenes into what federation does, and volunteering at Super Sunday is a great way to begin your involvement.”
As for the multi-federation collaboration, she said, “It’s still too early to tell what effect the joint effort will have, but certainly, the fact that we have a joint theme and logo has helped us focus on developing our own community’s efforts consistent with that theme.”
For more information on volunteering for Super Sunday, call Nussbaum at 908-889-5335 or go to www.jewishjerseycentral.org.
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