Local News
Rady JCC reports deficit of $377,994 for 2022 fiscal year
By BERNIE BELLAN As someone who has attended my fair share of Annual General Meetings over the years, my impression is that an AGM is not meant to serve as a forum where management is subjected to scrutiny over its performance.
I especially recall attending AGMs of the Crocus Fund, during which management did its level best to conceal the true performance of the fund. It was at the 2002 AGM of the Crocus Fund, however, that I stood up and, undoubtedly much to the chagrin of the members of the management team who were there, I said that I thought the Crocus Fund was in deep trouble and that unitholders were being kept in the dark about the true picture of the Crocus Fund.
Even though it took another year and a half for my assessment to be proven true, eventually the Crocus Fund was forced to halt sales of its shares, and was subsequently placed into receivership.
So, when I attended the most recent AGM of the Rady JCC on November 28 I went in determined to ask some pointed questions, regardless what other individuals who were there thought of the temerity of someone disrupting what had been, to that point, an evening of self-congratulation.
Now, as anyone who has attended any Jewish organization’s AGM would well understand, the main part of the proceedings is to get through the very boring financial report as quickly as possible and move on to a celebration of volunteers and employees who are to be recognized for their contributions to those organizations. And, until Covid entered the picture, the highlight of every AGM was the pastry table where attendees could feast following the AGM.
Serious affairs – those AGMS.
Well, for anyone who’s been paying attention the past two and a half years though, the Rady JCC has undergone what is undoubtedly the most harrowing period since it first opened its doors in 1997. Covid dealt a terrible blow to the Rady JCC, with a huge drop in memberships and a severe reduction in programming that began in March 2020 and which has continued through to the present day, although the situation has improved considerably in the past year.
That’s why, as I entered the multipurpose room of the Asper Campus on Monday evening, November 28, I was anxious to see whether anyone else was interested in asking any questions about the true state of the Rady JCC. Without going into every little detail of that report, here’s the nutshell: The Rady JCC showed a loss of $377,994 in 2022 (year end August 31, by the way).
That compares with a profit of $1,124,950 for the 2021 fiscal year. How is that possible, you might ask, when 2021 saw the Rady JCC absolutely shellacked as a result of Covid? Consider this: Membership revenue in 2021 dropped to $706,823. In 2019, which was the last year before Covid, membership revenue was $2,090,933. That’s a 66% drop in membership revenue! The explanation, if you read on, is quite simple: Government assistance is what kept the Rady JCC alive in 2021.
So, when the 2022 financial report showed that membership revenue had climbed somewhat over the 2021 figure – to $1,152,489, but was still a long way off from the pre-Covid figure, I was anxious to ask this question of the person who was delivering the financial report, whose name was Kyle Ibbetson:
“Just how many members does the Rady JCC actually have?” I asked.
As an aside, I was the only one to ask any questions at the AGM. I was told afterwards that if I had any questions I would have been better off to send them to Barry Miller, who is the Rady JCC’s Director of Finance and Administration. Right – as I noted previously, an AGM is no place to ask serious questions. It destroys the levity of the moment during which everyone is looking forward to a celebration, not a serious probing of what’s really going on.
In any event, I was somewhat surprised that Ibbetson actually had some figures to report in response to my question: The Rady JCC has 1700 members, he said, down from 2500 pre-Covid. (In a subsequent email Rady JCC Executive Director Rob Berkowits clarified that the correct figure is “1750” units. By the way, a unit can refer to anything from an individual to a family. If you read on you’ll see that I’ve always had difficulty with that term.)
Be that as it may, however, as I pored over the financial report while everyone else was watching a series of awards being handed out, a major discrepancy occurred to me as I did some quick calculations: If the membership had dropped from 2500 to 1700, that represented a 32% drop in membership, but what was the actual membership revenue prior to Covid – not the number of member units?
For that I had to wait until I was able to get home and Google previous financial reports of the Rady JCC. That was when I found the figure for membership revenue for 2019, as noted earlier, was $2,090,933. Membership revenue for 2022, according to this year’s financial report, was $1,152,489. That represents a 45% drop in membership revenue from 2019. So, if member units were down 32% but membership revenue was down 45%, what could explain that fairly large discrepancy, I wondered?
That same evening I penned a fairly long email to Barry Miller, which was also addressed to Rob Berkowits, in which I asked that question, along with several others.
Here is what I asked about membership revenue:
“In the area of membership, according to what Kyle Ibbetson said, you’re down from 2500 to 1700 pre-Covid – a 32% drop. But when I look at revenues from membership in 2019 they were $2,090.933, while in 2022 they were only $1,152,489. That represents a 45% drop in membership revenue from 2019. Can you explain the discrepancy between a 32% drop in member units and a 45% drop in membership revenue?”
Here is the response I received:
“The impact that the pandemic had on our membership and corresponding membership revenues has been drastic.
“When we were required to close the first time in March 2020, our membership units were at 2,628. We hit a low of 1,232 in October 2021. This represents a decline of 53%. The climb back up was very slow at the beginning as people were not comfortable coming to a gym or congregating and there were still many restrictions on gathering sizes, gym capacity, etc put on by the provincial government.
“We have slowly climbed since that date and we are now aggressively marketing new memberships and win backs. As of today, we are at 1,750 membership units, which is still down 33%.
“The revenue stream does not coincide with the drop in membership numbers. As you stated, membership revenue for 2022 is down 45% from 2019. As you are aware, we have memberships that range from $250 to $1,367 per year. The pandemic more greatly affected our higher membership fee categories (families, adult and senior couples, one parent family etc). If you lose a family membership as opposed to a child membership, yes, you are down one membership. But you are down 5.5 times the revenue. That is why it is very difficult to use the two statistics comparatively.”
I asked about the actual number of members, writing that “referring to membership units is rather vague. I know that’s the term that has always been applied when I’ve had discussions both with Gayle and with you, Rob, about memberships, but can you put it in actual terms of members, i.e., how many members were there in 2022 in comparison to 2019?”
The answer (and it is clear this was from Rob) was: “We have always referred to membership as a unit. That is the manner that we budget and report. The variables make it easier that way as each family unit or one parent family unit can have multiple individuals on it, non of which affect revenue.
“Just as information, the 1,750 membership units that we have today represents 3,076 individuals. I am not able to obtain that statistic historically, it is a live data file.”
Another area of the financial report that stood out for me had to do with fundraising. Elsewhere in the Rady JCC annual report, Rob Berkowits wrote that the 2022 sports dinner was “the most financially successful event in its history, raising $400,000 after all bills were paid.”
Yet, while the financial report did say that total fundraising for the Rady JCC raised $976,763, as compared with $401,214 in 2021 (when there was no sports dinner), fundraising expenses in 2022 were $563,856, while they were only $77,7987 in 2021. As a result I asked this question in my email to Barry and Rob: “The total profit from fundraising was only $79,480 more in 2022 than in 2021. If the sports dinner raised $400,000 after all bills were paid,’ according to Rob’s report, why was there only $77,787 more raised in fundraising in 2022 than in 2021?”
The answer I received was fairly detailed – and quite complex, but here is the most salient point, written, I assume by Barry Miller: “In the areas of other fundraising, our costs associated with the donations were considerably higher this year than in 2021 ($156,000 in 2022 as opposed to $36,000 in 2021).”
I suppose I might like to explore why that was at another point in the future – and by now, anyone reading my ongoing reports about the 2021 census would know that I like to crunch number, but for the moment, we’ll leave that aside.
Finally though, one figure in the 2022 financial report just jumped off the page, and that was the amount of government assistance the Rady JCC received in 2021: $1,690,109. (It dropped to $434,898 in 2022.)
I took a look at the 2020 financial report and saw that the Rady JCC also received a huge amount of government funding in 2020: $750,605. As a result the total amount of government funding the Rady JCC has received the past three years is $2,885, 612.
I think it’s fair to say that, without that government funding, the Rady JCC would have had to close its doors permanently – and I suggested that in my email to Barry and Rob.
Here is the response I received and again, I assume it was written by Rob: “If it wasn’t for government assistance, there are many many many businesses and organizations, both for profit and not-for-profit that may not be around today. Whether Rady would be one of them is very open to conjecture and opinion. We went into the pandemic in a strong financial position and we have many very loyal members, donors and third party funders to support us.”
That may indeed be true, but looming over this entire discussion of Rady JCC finances is this question: How many of the Rady JCC’s members who have not renewed their memberships (which, I submit, is evidenced by the 45% drop in membership revenue much more clearly than the 32% drop in “membership units”) may return to the Rady JCC at some point? Further, despite the notion that Covid is behind us, if at least one-third of Rady JCC members have not returned to the Rady JCC since Covid (and, as I would argue, the figure is likely much more than one-third based on the total drop in membership revenue), are former members staying away because they don’t feel sufficiently safe at the campus or are there other reasons? Perhaps some members have joined other facilities, while others installed home gym equipment. Regardless the reasons, there is no doubt that the drop in membership revenue is having a huge impact on the Rady JCC’s bottom line.
Finally, if there should have been special awards handed out at this year’s AGM for service above and beyond, it should have gone to representatives from the provincial and federal governments for the assistance both levels of government delivered to the Rady JCC over the past three years.
Local News
Who is Rabbi Ephraim Bryks and how did his time in Winnipeg prove so convulsive?
By BERNIE BELLAN (Posted December 30) Thirty-five years after Rabbi Ephraim Bryks left this city his name is now back in the news as the result of a new lawsuit that names Rabbi Bryks, the Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregation – for which Bryks served as rabbi for 12 years, and two rabbinical organizations as defendants. You can read more about that lawsuit and what it alleges elsewhere on this website at “lawsuit filed.“
But, aside from questions about why this lawsuit was filed now – some 38 years after the acts for which Bryks is accused of having committed against the plaintiff, there are still so many unanswered questions about Rabbi Bryks’ time in Winnipeg.
In his seminal history of the Jewish people of Manitoba, Allan Levine wrote: “The biggest controversy in the Herzlia’s history – in fact, arguably the most controversial matter in the annals of the Winnipeg Jewish community – involved Rabbi Ephraim Bryks, the synagogue’s rabbi from 1978 to 1990. Bryks arrived in Winnipeg in 1978 at the age of twenty-four, with his wife Yochevaed…”
Levine noted that “Under Bryks’ leadership, the synagogue’s membership increased. He established new programs for youth and immersed himself in the Jewish community. He also initiated Torah Academy, an Orthodox elementary school that operated out of Herzlia and soon had a sizable (sic.) enrollment (sic.).” (Gee Allan, didn’t anyone check your book for spelling mistakes?)
Levine’s story about Bryks goes on to note that controversy first began to circulate openly around Bryks in 1985 in the pages of what our paper was then called, which was the Jewish Post. (We didn’t become The Jewish Post & News until 1987, which was when we took over what had been The Western Jewish News.)
Bryks had been writing a weekly Torah commentary in our paper until three rabbis – Rabbis Rappaport, Weizman, and Neil Rose, sent a letter to the editor (who was my late brother, Matt, at the time) accusing Bryks of having plagiarized several of his columns from a book by Rabbi Reuven Bulka. Matt investigated and discovered that Bryks had indeed plagiarized at least two columns from Bulka’s book. When Matt reported what he had found, Bryks stopped writing his column for us.
“Far worse was yet to come,” Levine’s section about Bryks continues. “In 1987, several parents of young (male and female) children attending Torah Academy alleged that Bryks had sexually abused their children. The Herzlia board properly investigated the matter and heard evidence. According to a CBC-TV documentary on the case, the parents and their children were accused of being liars.”
Levine goes on to note that Winnipeg South Child and Family Services were asked to investigate the matter by the synagogue board, but the agency concluded that “Bryks’ behaviour of having children sit on his lap while he tickled them was ‘neither appropriate nor professional’, but not illegal. That might have been the end of it, but another allegation was made, this time to the Winnipeg Police by parents of an eight-year-old boy who claimed Bryks had fondled him. The police consulted a Crown lawyer, who decided not to pursue it since it came down to the child’s word against that of a rabbi.
“The case tore the Herzlia congregation apart, and some members left the synagogue,” Levine writes.
In 1990, Bryks left Winnipeg for Montreal, where he had been hired to head a Jewish school until parents there learned of the allegations against him in Winnipeg and the offer of employment was rescinded.
Subsequently, Bryks moved to New York, where he founded another private religious school in Queens – this time for children of Russian immigrants.
In 2003, however, Bryks resigned his membership in the Rabbinical Council of America. According to a report on “Newsday,” Bryks had “been dogged by allegations of sexual abuse against at least one Winnipeg child for more than 15 years.” He had headed two different yeshivas in New York, but no longer did so.
That Winnipeg child’s name was Daniel Levin. He was the son of Martin and Sarah Levin. (Martin Levin had been editor of the Jewish Post until 1983. He later became the books editor of the Toronto Globe & Mail.)
In Allan Levine’s account of what happened, “Daniel Levin had attended Torah Academy from kindergarten to Grade 2. …A troubled teenager, Daniel alleged that Bryks had molested him. According to Sarah Levin, Bryks had given Daniel candy to keep him quiet and told him that God would punish him if he ever told anyone what had transpired. The threat of retribution was echoed by other children who came forward. Daniel (who, by 1993, was living in Toronto) gave a taped statement to the Toronto Police, who inexplicably botched the taping and requested he repeat his statement. He never did. On Yom Kippur, 1993, Daniel, seventeen years old, committed suicide.”
In 1994, the CBC aired a documentary about the Bryks controversy titled “Unorthodox Conduct.” Myron Love wrote a detailed report about the airing of that documentary and the subsequent reaction to it from members of the Herzlia. You can read Myron’s full article on our website simply by entering the name “Rabbi Bryks” in our Search Archive portal. The first two articles to appear will be the first and second pages of Myron’s comprehensive report.
According to information online Rabbi Bryks now works as a mortgage broker in New York. For a time, he was also a self-styled marriage counsellor, providing services to women seeking religious divorces.
In 2018, we spoke with a woman in New York who told us that, 18 or 19 years prior, she had contacted Rabbi Bryks to try to help her get a “get” (religious divorce) from an uncooperative husband. That woman claimed that Rabbi Bryks showed up at her apartment and tried to take advantage of her under the guise of offering to help her obtain a “get” from her husband. As the woman continued her story, she said Rabbi Bryks had forced himself upon her to the point where he pushed her on to her bed and lay on top of her. She was eventually able to break free and demanded he leave her apartment.
There are many other references to Bryks on the internet. The recently filed lawsuit only adds to what is already one of the most controversial stories about a rabbi you’re ever likely to read.
Local News
Former Winnipegger files lawsuit against Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregation, former Herzlia Rabbi Ephraim Bryks, and two other defendants over allegations of sexual abuse and assault by Rabbi Bryks in 1987
By BERNIE BELLAN (Posted December 29, 2025) A former Winnipegger by the name of Ruth Krevsky (née Pinsky) has filed a lawsuit in Court of King’s Bench in Winnipeg on December 9, 2025 naming “Ephraim Boruk Bryks, Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregtion Inc., Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, and Rabbinical Council of America” as defendants.
The lawsuit seeks damages in the total amount of $4,200,000.
In the 30-page statement of claim Krevsky alleges that “In or around 1984, when the Plaintiff was approximately 19 years of age, Bryks sexually abused and assaulted the Plaintiff. The particulars of same include, but not (sic.) are not limited to the following:
” (a) initiated and engaged in physical contact of a sexual nature with the Plaintiff in his bedroom;
” (b) strapped the buttocks of the Plaintiff;
” (c) engaged in other sexual activities with the Plaintiff; and
” (d) in order to facilitate the abuse Bryks engaged in a pattern of behaviour which was intended to make the Plaintiff feel that she was special in the eyes of Bryks and Judaism.
“The abuse occurred in Bryks’ house located in Winnipeg, Manitoba.”
The lawsuit goes on to allege that “After the aforementioned abuse occurred, Bryks exploited his position of seniority and the trust he had cultivated with the Plaintiff to manipulate and control He used this dependency to discourage the Plaintiff from disclosing his actions, including by threatening her and by withholding reference letters essential for her academic and professional advancement.”
The lawsuit further alleges that “In or around 1987, while employed by the Congregation, Bryks was accused by (sic.) of several sexual offences involving young girls and women, including students at the School. (Ed. note, the reference is to Torah Academy, which Bryks started.) Although no criminal charges were filed at the time, the allegations were brought to the attention of the Congregation, the Union (of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America) and/or the Council (Rabbinical Council of America). Since then. additional individuals have come forward with similar allegations of sexual abuse by Bryks.”
The lawsuit also names the Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregtion Inc., as defendant, citing ten different rules that “the Congregation taught the Plaintiff as well as other members of the Synagogue, including
“that it was forbidden to report a Jewish religious figure such as a rabbi to secular authorities and that any such reporting would constitute a serious violation of religious duty and loyalty to Judaism.”
Further, “The Plaintiff pleads that the aforementioned rules, principles and ideologies of the Congregation created an opportunity for Bryks to exert power and authority over the Plaintiff. The power and authority allowed Bryks to engage in the aforementioned behaviour and to continue to engage in same without resistance or question of the Plaintiff, without risk of getting caught, and thereby put the Plaintiff at risk of being abused by Bryks…
“As a result, the Congregation is vicariously responsible and liable for the actions of Bryks.”
The lawsuit goes on to list a series of behaviours in which it alleges Bryks was engaging and alleges the Congregation ignored many aspects of Bryks’ behaviour, including, among others: “Bryks’ difficulties with alcohol” and “Bryks’ difficulties with his sexuality.”
The lawsuit lists a long series of damages the Plaintiff alleges she has suffered as a result of Bryks’ behaviour and the refusal of the other defendants, including the Herzlia Congregation, to take any action against Bryks.
It should be made clear that, at this point, the allegations are unproven and are yet to be defended against and yet to be tested in the courts of Manitoba.
We have reached out to Ruth Krevsky, her counsel, counsel for the Adas Yeshurun Herzlia Congregation, and the president of the congregation for comment. To date, we have not heard from either Ms. Krevsky or her counsel. We did hear from the president of the congregation, who asked us to refer any questions to counsel for the congregation. We did speak with counsel for the congregation, but at this point he indicated that he had just been recently hired to represent the congregation and was just beginning to acquaint himself with the file.
The Rabbi Bryks story was one that tore the Winnipeg Jewish community asunder. The Jewish Post had a number of stories about the allegations that were levelled against Rabbi Bryks. (You can find those stories by going to our “Search Archive” link and entering the name “Rabbi Bryks.”)
We will have much more about Rabbi Bryks in the days to come. Keep referring to this website as we add to the story.
Local News
Newly announced Vivian Silver Centre for Shared Society to further former Winnipegger’s lifelong efforts to foster Jewish-Arab co-operation in Israel
By MYRON LOVE Vivian Silver (oleh Hashalom) devoted her life to working toward dialogue and collaboration between Arabs and Jews in Israel. The culmination of her efforts was the Arab-Jewish Center for Empowerment, Equality, and Cooperation – Negev Institute for Strategies of Peace and Economic Development (AJEEC-NISPED), which she co-founded 25 year ago with her sister peace activist, Dr. Amal Elsana Ahl’jooj.
Tragically, Vivian was of the 1,200 Israeli Jews, Bedouin and foreign farm workers who were slaughtered during the Hamas-led pogrom of October 7, 2023.
Last month, AJEEC-NISPED announced plans to create the Vivian Silver Center for Shared Society in her memory – a new national hub for Jewish-Israeli Arab collaboration and social innovation in Be’er Sheva – backed by an initial $1 million donation from UJA-Federation of New York, along with support from the Meyerhoff Foundation, the Gilbert Foundation, and other philanthropic partners committed to strengthening shared society in Israel.
“It’s a great honor and a beautiful gesture,” comments Vivian’s son, Yonatan Zeigen, “and I hope it will be a central building for civil society, both in the physical sense, that it will become a substantial home for the organization and for other initiatives that will use the spaced and also symbolically, as a beacon for this kind of work in the specific location in the Negev.”
As this writer noted n an article earlier this year in relation to the announcement of the launch of the Vivian Silver Impact Award by the New Israel Fund (NIF) – of which she was a long time board member, and which was developed in conjunction with her sons, Yonatan and Chen), Vivian made aliyah in 1974. She first went to Israel in 1968 – to spend her second year at university abroad at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, studying psychology and English literature.
In an article she wrote in 2018 in a publication called ”Women Wage Peace,” she related that during her final year at the University of Manitoba, she was among the founders of the Student Zionist Alliance on campus and was invited to its national conference in Montreal. There she met activists in the Habonim youth movement who planned on making aliyah and re-establishing Kibbutz Gezer. The day she wrote her last university exam, she boarded a flight to New York to join the group.
She spent three years in New York, where she became involved in Jewish and Zionist causes, including the launch of the Jewish feminist movement in America.
“It was a life-changing period,” she recalled. “I came to understood that in addition to being a kibbutz member, I was destined to be a social change and peace activist.”
Vivian and her group made aliyah in 1974 and settled on Kibbutz Gezer. In 1981, she established the Department Promoting Gender Equality in the Kibbutz Movement. She moved to Kibbutz Be’eri near the Gaza border in 1990, along with her late husband, Lewis, and their two sons
In 1998, Vivian became the executive director of the Negev Institute for Strategies of Peace and Development in Beer Sheva, an NGO promoting human sustainable development, shared society between Jews and Arabs, and peace in the Middle East. Soon after, she was joined by Amal Elsana Alh’jooj as co-directors of AJEEC-NISPED, winning the 2011 Victor J. Goldberg Peace Prize of the Institute for International Education.
In the article she wrote for “Women Waging Peace,” she noted that “while we later focused on empowerment projects in the Bedouin community in the Negev, initially we worked with Palestinian organizations on joint people-to-people projects. I spent much time in Gaza until the outbreak of the second intifada. We continued working with organizations in the West Bank. I personally know so many Palestinians who yearn for peace no less than we do.”
According to a report in the Israeli newspaper Arutz Sheva, in the November 24th edition, the Vivian Silver Centre – which is expected to open in the spring – will be located within AJEEC-NISPED’s soon-to-open AJEEC House, and will provide a permanent home for programs that promote equality, leadership, and cooperation among Israel’s diverse communities.
“The Vivian Silver Center for Shared Society, within AJEEC’s headquarters, “the Arutz Sheva report noted, “will serve as a regional platform for dozens of Israeli Arab and Jewish social organizations. Through AJEEC’s educational, vocational, and leadership programs, the center will support thousands of young adults each year – offering mentorship, professional training, and opportunities for cross-cultural collaboration.
“These programs,” the report continued, “already reach more than 15,000 participants nationwide, helping young people integrate into higher education and meaningful employment while narrowing social and economic gaps.”
AJEEC House is located in Be’er Sheva’s Science Park, near Ben-Gurion University. The three-storey AJEEC House has been designed to foster cooperation and dialogue. It will host community partnerships, provide shared workspaces for social entrepreneurs, and serve as a hub for initiatives addressing social and economic development across the Negev and beyond.
Readers who may be interested considering a donation can dial into NISPED’s website – – for further information.