04/17/2025
Federation Older Adult Task Force Identifies Ways to Assist Cleveland’s Aging Jewish Community
Stock photo/ Pexels
ABIGAIL PREISZIG
Article reprinted with permission from Cleveland Jewish News
The older adult population in the United States is poised for unprecedented growth in the coming decades, according to a report released by the Jewish Federation of Cleveland.
Hurwitz
The U.S. Census Bureau projects that by the year 2030, over 71 million, or one in five Americans, will be 65 or older, the report said. As this population continues to increase, its needs, characteristics and preferences about how they want to age are also evolving within a shifting local and national service landscape.
“We all know that the only thing constant in life is change and what was revealed was that the numbers of seniors as a percentage of the total population has grown considerably and continues to grow,” Susan Hurwitz, the Federation’s Older Adult Task Force chair, told the Cleveland Jewish News. “In Jewish Cleveland especially, there are more seniors relatively than there have been in many, many years. The fact that people are living longer and many needing medical care as they age and other kinds of care, it became very critical for the Jewish Federation to figure out what was available and what was missing and where the Federation might make a difference in the lives of older folks.”
The Report on the 2024 Older Adult Task Force was released by the Federation earlier this year, identifying many themes among older adults who are members of the Cleveland Jewish community and organizing them according to the greatest need and the potential impact the Federation and its partners can have.
Comprised of 28 thought leaders and organizational representatives and commissioned by the Federation’s community planning committee, the Older Adult Task Force began meeting in January 2024, the CJN previously reported.
Bichsel
One of its primary goals was to pinpoint the greatest needs of the Jewish older adult population – defined in the report as those who are 65 years and older – and their unpaid caregivers and prioritize where community resources and planning efforts should be directed.
“While the process took quite a while and the participants all came from such varied places … there was quite a bit of consensus and quite a lot of repetition of the themes in the end,” Susan Bichsel, president and CEO of Jewish Family Service Association of Cleveland in Pepper Pike and a member of the task force, told the CJN.
The group’s results were summarized into four key priority areas and recommendations to be operationalized by the community planning committee and the Federation’s Jewish Volunteer Network, Hurwitz said. Therefore, the task force’s work is complete.
To create the report, the task force first defined its population of focus and individual and systemic factors, then it gathered information through a scan of the service landscape and a community input process.
Certain findings, such as the importance of systems advocacy and volunteerism opportunities, were woven into the set of recommendations, the report said. The task force deemed other findings, like the impact of increased cost of living and staffing shortages, largely systemic issues and shared this information with the Federation’s allocations committee to include in opportunities for larger systemic advocacy.
However, as plans for implementation and sustainability are developed, these systemic issues will require careful consideration, the report said.
“We’re getting very positive feedback,” Hurwitz said. “People are just relieved, if you will, that the Federation (is) very aware now of what those needs are and has every intention of helping to the greatest extent possible. … This is just the latest response to the changing environment.”
The Federation staff members will work with partner organizations, colleagues and lay leaders to develop and execute implementation plans, the report said. Evaluation plans will also be developed to monitor the effectiveness and measure the impact of implementation.
Given the urgency of the needs, some recommendations were initiated during the task force process, the report said. According to Hurwitz, JFSA and the Federation brought social workers to Deer Creek Lodge on the King David Healthcare Center campus, formerly Wiggins Place on the Menorah Park campus, an assisted and independent living facility in Beachwood, for support groups and more.
Menorah Park, the area’s Jewish senior living campus for 55 years, was sold in December 2023 to New Jersey-based Outcome Healthcare, going from a nonprofit supported by two foundations to a for-profit organization, the CJN previously reported.
As a for-profit business, the senior living facility is no longer eligible for a Federation allocation, the report said.
In recent years, like many other Jewish and non-Jewish nonprofit senior living facilities across the U.S., Menorah Park faced significant financial and operating challenges because of low occupancy in revenue generating services, low reimbursement rates and high staffing costs.
“People there were feeling kind of abandoned because the Jewish Federation just wasn’t there, there wasn’t a presence because it’s now privately owned,” Hurwitz said. “... There are plans to look into other long-term care facilities that might benefit from the same kind of outreach from the Jewish community.”
The landscape scan included cataloging over 25 programs across seven Jewish nonprofit organizations in the Cleveland area providing service to older adults, a panel of four leaders of Jewish nonprofit service providers and over 30 interviews with local and national professionals from both the Jewish and general communities, the report said.
The task force then developed an interview guide using key themes from the scan and a recent community needs assessment by the Center for Community Solutions, a nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank in Cleveland.
It then gathered perspectives from 32 older adults and their caregivers via two in-person focus groups and 14 interviews conducted by phone or zoom, lasting 45 to 60 minutes, during July and August 2024.
Participants were recruited through community members, including nonprofit professionals, case managers and rabbis, who distributed invitations within their networks and by word-of-mouth, the report said. Interviewers took thorough notes during and after the sessions, which were analyzed for common themes.
According to the report, barriers due to medical needs and level of functioning, financial barriers and gaps caused by the absence of natural supports surfaced repeatedly throughout the service landscape scan and interview processes, manifesting differently in each person’s life depending on a wide range of factors.
Bichsel said the COVID-19 pandemic created many obstacles for older adults, including electronic health records, scheduling and appointments and staffing challenges, making it an “interesting time” for the task force.
“I think this process helped us crystallize the kind of help that people need to navigate the landscape today with those existing new challenges that we have in a post-pandemic environment and also, just where the medical world is today,” she said.
According to the report, the Ohio Department on Aging projects that between 2020 and 2040, Ohio’s population of those age 60 and older is expected to grow four times faster than the state’s overall population.
Known as population aging, this shift in which the older adult population is expected to continue to increase relative to the younger population is due to mortality improvements and declining fertility in the U.S. over recent decades, the report said.
According to the report, in Jewish Cleveland, the 2022 Cleveland Jewish Community Study shows that the proportion of Jewish older adults is even higher than the general population.
An estimated 35% of all Jewish Clevelanders are age 65 or older, which includes 20% in the 65 to 74 age range and 15% in the 75 and older group. An estimated 21% of Jewish adults provide regular care for someone age 65 or older.
“As someone whose worked in the social service space for the last 30 years, I think it’s the message back to our older adults that the community is here for them, that we’ve taken the time to go through this process and we’ve come up with some actionable steps,” Bichsel said. “… Our older adults are pretty engaged and pretty articulate and verbal about their needs, what’s lacking and some of the things that they’d like to see happen, but they need partners in that, and it feels good to say we have a roadmap for that.”
To read the full report, visit shorturl.at/6fwKi.
Four priority areas
The Report on the 2024 Older Adult Task Force prioritized four areas according to the greatest need and the potential impact that the Jewish Federation of Cleveland and its partners can have.
Care Navigation and Planning for Aging
Planning for, navigating and managing care for older adults often involves numerous services, including financial and legal planning, information and referral, care navigation and comprehensive case management, the report said. Older adults and their families often struggle to navigate these complex systems as their needs, preferences and abilities change.
“That could be anything from – you’ve been diagnosed with dementia so what’s next? Or you are somebody who’s in and out of the hospital … how do you navigate the systems and make sure all your doctors are talking,” Susan Bichsel, president and CEO of Jewish Family Service Association of Cleveland, said.
The report recommended that providers and community leaders thoughtfully plan and collaborate to care for older adults and their families, so individuals and their families feel they have the support and resources they need to confidently navigate older adulthood.
Isolation and Loneliness
Many trends within the older adult population and environmental factors carry risks of isolation and loneliness, the report said. These include preference to age at home; greater longevity, increased health needs and limited mobility; limited transportation access; ageism and stigma surrounding aging. Isolation, loneliness and stress also impact family caregivers due to time constraints and changing relationship dynamics.
The report recommended older adults engage in a variety of activities that support their social wellbeing while also accessing essential services and resources; create and maintain connections to communities regardless of where they live; and organizations increase socialization opportunities and reduce isolation of individuals and families living with dementia and other neuro-cognitive issues.
Housing and Supportive Services
Nearly all service providers emphasized the importance of affordable housing in meeting the needs of older adults, while also underscoring the complexity of the issues and, therefore, the need for collaboration across organizations and sectors, the report said.
The report recommended increasing the number and variety of housing options for low- and middle-income older adults; and individuals and families understand their housing options, have access to housing resources and services and develop housing strategies to meet their current and future needs.
Transportation
Current transportation options for older adults are supplemental, with limits on the types of rides, hours of availability and frequency of rides, the report said. Access varies greatly depending on geographic location, including proximity to public transportation and whether the individual’s municipality provides senior transportation services.
“Transportation can be everything from being able to visit your spouse in a nursing home to getting to medical appointments to, ‘I want to be able to go to shul for services,’” Bichsel said. “So, that’s in a lot of ways a low-cost way to make sure people are safely connected to the community. That can have a pretty big impact.”
Transportation services typically prioritize medical appointments over all other types of rides, the report said. Providers report that transportation services are increasingly expensive due to rising insurance costs, maintenance costs and limited staffing.
The report recommended older adults have greater access and encounter fewer barriers to transportation services by enhancing access and reduce barriers to existing transportation services and expand low-cost and supportive transportation options to fill current gaps caused by financial and medical needs.
Service landscape scan interview list
Association of Jewish Aging Services
Beachwood Community Center
Benjamin Rose
Bikur Cholim
Bradley Greene, Esq.
Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine
Center for Community Solutions
Cleveland Veteran Affairs Medical Center
Community Partnership on Aging
Council Gardens
Cuyahoga County Division of Senior and Adult Services
Gesher
Jennings
Jewish Family Services Association
Jewish Federation of Cleveland
Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh
Jewish Federation of Tucson
Jewish Federations of North America
Judson Senior Living Communities
Kendal at Oberlin
King David Senior Living Center
Kosher Food Pantry
McGregor Foundation
McGregor PACE
MetroHealth
Network of Jewish Human Services Agencies
Rabbi Binyamin Blau
Rabbi Hal Rudin-Luria
Rabbi Melinda Mersack
Schnurmann House
Senior Transportation Connection
The Jewish Association on Aging, Pittsburgh
The Mandel Jewish Community Center
United Way of Greater Cleveland
University Hospitals
Western Reserve Area Agency on Aging
SOURCE: Jewish Federation of Cleveland’s Older Adult Task Force
Older Adult Task Force members and professional staff
Susan R. Hurwitz
Susan R. Borison
Dr. Howard G. Epstein
Rabbi Akiva Feinstein
The late Dr. Michael H. Frankel
Allan Goldner
Kathryn W. Hexter
Lawrence A. Mack
Kenneth E. Marblestone
Kevin D. Margolis
Dr. Bradley S. Marino
Marjorie E. Newman
Cameron Orlean
Dr. Michael Pollack
Keith Polster
The late Richard S. Rivitz
Cathy Stamler
Seth R. Vilensky
Judy Willensky
Idelle K. Wolf
Warren L. Wolfson
Mitchell Balk, Mt. Sinai Health Foundation
Susie Bichsel, Ph.D., Jewish Family Service Association
Traci Felder, Mandel Jewish Community Center
Melanie Halvorson, Jewish Federation of Cleveland
Rabbi Aryeh Leib Joseph, Bikur Cholim
Ellen Miller, Jewish Federation of Cleveland
Emily Shapiro, Jewish Federation of Cleveland
