Redmer vs. Olszewski, Rabbi Fink out, Goucher president stepping down
Republican Al Redmer and Democrat Johnny Olszewski debate
In their final debate, the candidates for Baltimore County Executive differed over affordable housing, Pre-Kindergarten, and how to treat people who live in the country illegally, according to WYPR. The final forum between Republican Al Redmer and Democrat Johnny Olszewski came two weeks before Election Day. The debate aired on the Oct. 22 Midday program on WYPR and the candidates staked out clear differences in education. Olszewski said he is committed to offering voluntary Pre-K. “The research on the benefits of Pre-K is clear,” Olszewski said. In fact, if financially faced to choose between Pre-K and 12th grade, Olszewski would choose the former. Olszewski, a former high school teacher, said some would-be 12th graders could be elsewhere. “Oftentimes, seniors in high school are already on work release, or they are taking electives they don’t necessarily need or they are already in community college,” Olszewski said. Redmer said he supports an expansion of Pre-K. But it’s just one of many unmet needs in the county. “So it’s a high priority but I can’t tell you it’s the highest priority and we can do it in one fell swoop because I don’t think we can,” Redmer said. Because the county’s finances are pretty tight, Redmer said the county should at least consider renting school buildings from developers with an option to buy. Olszewski called that a terrible idea.
Read more: Final Face-to-Face Match Up in Baltimore County Executive Race
Also see: Catching Up with Candidates for Baltimore County Executive
Rabbi Fink voted out
By a vote of 515 to 91, Temple Oheb Shalom’s congregation decided at an Oct. 21 meeting to terminate its spiritual leader of 19 years, Rabbi Steven M. Fink. On Aug. 22 and Sept. 26, the 165-year-old Pikesville temple’s board of trustees voted unanimously to begin termination proceedings against Rabbi Fink due to allegations of sexual misconduct and ethical violations. The vote came in the wake of an Aug. 20 vote by the Central Conference of American Rabbis’ ethics committee to suspend Rabbi Fink from the rabbinate due to the alleged violations. (The CCAR is the Reform movement’s national rabbinic leadership organization.) In a phone interview with Jmore shortly after learning of the congregational vote, Rabbi Fink, 67, said he was “very disappointed for me and the congregation. They have destroyed the congregation today. I’m not surprised [about the vote] because the vast majority of our supporters have left the congregation. I would’ve been amazed if I’d won.” Nonetheless, the rabbi said he will continue to fight. He said he plans to talk about the next legal steps with his attorney, Andrew Jay Graham of the law firm Kramon & Graham. “The battle is over, but the war goes on,” Rabbi Fink said. “We will be engaging in litigation with the congregation. This is a travesty of justice. Hopefully, our civil rights will be respected in the courts and I can have due process, which I was denied throughout this whole ordeal. … I know I have done nothing wrong, but have been treated unfairly and I’m a victim of – as [celebrity lawyer] Alan Dershowitz calls it – ‘sexual McCarthyism.’”
Read our complete coverage of Rabbi Fink’s termination here.
Goucher College president José Bowen to step down in June 2019
After four years at the helm of Goucher College in Towson, José Bowen announced Oct. 19 in an email to the campus community and alumni that he’s stepping down after the current academic year, according to Baltimore Fishbowl. “I believe it is time for a change of direction for me personally, as I remain deeply passionate about my research, scholarship, music and teaching,” Bowen wrote in a letter to the liberal arts college’s community. In particular, he said he’s finishing a book about his time spent at Goucher College, which will add up to five years by the time he leaves next June. Bowen’s tenure at Goucher has included the launch of a $100 million capital campaign, which Bowen wrote is now more than halfway fulfilled, as well as replacement of student housing and dining facilities, the addition of a video application option for prospective students and consecutive years of minimal or no tuition increases. It’s also included flat or declining enrollment—a plight shared by other small area colleges and universities—and, more recently, some controversial cuts of nearly a dozen majors, among them music, art, math and education programs. A search committee will pick Goucher College’s next president, which will be its 16th. Bowen’s last day is June 30, 2019.
Read more: Goucher College president José Bowen to step down in June 2019
Also see: Lessons from Local Jewish University and College Presidents
School district wants proof student is Jewish
A Jewish mother in North Texas said her child’s school asked for proof that her daughter is Jewish in order to excuse her for Yom Kippur. Lauren Gordon told local CBS affiliate CBS 11 Dallas Fort Worth on Oct. 18 that when she asked last month for her daughter’s absence from school on Yom Kippur to be excused, the Garland Independent School District requested that she “send documentation from the religious establishment you attended,” according to the report. “That response basically told me that they didn’t believe that we were Jewish. That they needed proof. Honestly, it upset me just as much as it made me angry,” she said. After she posted about it on Facebook, she found out that other schools in the area also were asking for proof of Jewishness in order to excuse children from school for Jewish holidays. Gordon said that after she complained to the school’s principal she “formally apologized, said she did not mean to offend us in any way and moving forward this will never be an issue at her school while she is there.”
Read more: North Texas school district asks mom to prove her child is Jewish to excuse Yom Kippur absence
S.C. law would deny Jewish families from fostering children
The Trump Administration is considering whether to grant a South Carolina request that would effectively allow faith-based foster care agencies in the state the ability to deny Jewish parents from fostering children in its network, according to The Intercept. The argument, from the state and from the agency, is that the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act should not force a Protestant group to work with Jewish people if it violates a tenet of their faith. The case being made by South Carolina is an extension of the debate around RFRA, which is more commonly associated with discrimination against LGBTQ people, but by no means applies exclusively to that group. If granted, the exemption would allow Miracle Hill Ministries, a Protestant social service agency working in the state’s northwest region, to continue receiving federal dollars while “recruiting Christian foster families,” which it has been doing since 1988, according to its website. That discrimination would apply not just to Jewish parents, but also to parents who are Muslim, Catholic, Unitarian, atheist, agnostic or other some other non-Protestant Christian denomination.
Read more: South Carolina is Lobbying to Allow Discrimination Against Jewish Parents
Trump and transgender rights
President Trump said Oct. 22 that his administration is “seriously” considering changing the way it treats transgender people under the law, confirming what administration officials describe as a debate about whether to define a person’s sex as a biological fact determined at birth, according to The Washington Post. The Health and Human Services Department has been pushing for the change, a fresh and direct aim at transgender rights, hoping other departments embrace that approach for sweeping impact. But it is unclear whether there is support for the broader effort or whether the regulation would be issued at all, as some in the administration are pushing back. Such a change seeks to negate claims that gender identity — rather than biological gender — can be used for protection under federal civil rights laws such as Title IX, which bans sex discrimination. If such regulations were adopted, the federal government would consider a transgender person’s sex to be what is determined at birth rather than the gender with which they identify.
Mussolini’s granddaughter sends threatening tweet
The granddaughter of Benito Mussolini unleashed a storm of protest from the Jewish community with a tweeted threat to sue anyone who posted “pictures or phrases” that were “offensive” regarding her grandfather, Italy’s Nazi ally fascist dictator. Alessandra Mussolini, a longtime right-wing politician and currently an Italian member of the European Parliament, posted the tweet on Oct. 17. Italian Jews and others took to social media to protest. One of the Italian Jews whose response was most shared was the Florence-based actor and musician Enrico Fink, who wrote an open letter to Mussolini on his Facebook page and posted a photo of his grandfather. The grandfather and 10 other members of his father’s family, Fink told Mussolini, were deported from Italy to their deaths in Auschwitz “under orders signed by your grandfather.” The media picked up the post, which went viral – it had been shared nearly 20,000 times by Oct. 22.—JTA
Bomb found in mail box of George Soros’ New York home
An explosive device was found in the mailbox outside of the New York home of controversial Jewish billionaire George Soros. The device found on Oct. 22 was detonated by a police bomb squad, the New York Times reported. The home is located in Katonah, N.Y., a hamlet in the upscale town of Bedford in northern Westchester County. A package containing the bomb was opened by an employee in the Soros home, who called police on Oct. 22. Soros was not at the home when the bomb was discovered, according to the Times. The case has been turned over to the FBI. Police said there is no threat to public safety.–JTA
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