This just in from Shelly Hahne, Coordinator of the Hand Up Youth Food Pantry:

With the economic downturn, our Hand Up Youth Food Pantry is serving more clients than ever before. The number of clients receiving supplementary food bags has increased by 27% in the last 3 months alone—101% from this same time last year. Our food pantry now serves more than 1,400 clients  each month at 12 different locations throughout the county.

If you want to learn how to lose weight and keep it off, find a meeting at www.weightwatchers.com.

If your business is interested in helping the San Diego community by hosting a food drive, please contact the Hand Up Youth Food Pantry Coordinator, Shelly Hahne, at 858.637.3088 or handup@jfssd.org.

Maybe you’ve heard about Avi and Margarita–or maybe you’ve just seen them up in Times Square in New York. Avi, a JFS Board Member and Jewish Big Pal of nine years, and Margarita, a JFS Geriatric Case Manager, met through J-Date in 2007. They were married in April. Avi’s little pal, Michael, was the ring bearer in the wedding and signed the ketubah. So where does Times Square come in? This handsome couple of newly weds is now the face of J*Date’s marketing campaign! As you can see in the photo, their ads were bigger than life in Times Square recently. We are so happy for the two of them – Mazel Tov again!

Check out the photos:

Two articles in the local newspaper last week attest to the sad state of our economy: unemployment and poverty are up. We’re seeing it everyday at JFS. Jobs are hard to come by—any job. I was talking to someone who’s daughter graduated with a master’s degree and is happy to get work anywhere, basically doing anything. People who were getting by, maybe by the skin of their teeth, are now hardly able to stay afloat. Many of these folks are demoralized and depressed. It’s not what they thought would happen to them. It’s going to take years for some of these families to get back on track. Luckily, we’re here to help them.

Read the article about Poverty>>

Read the article about Unemployment>>

For the past year, JFS of San Diego has ranked as the #1 refugee resettlement program amongst all of the 140+ JFS’ in North America, in terms of the number of émigrés being resettled. This past year, 498 people from a variety of countries—-Iraq, Myanmar, Eritrea, China, Iran, and Tibet—sought refuge in San Diego. This is a huge number and testimony to the incredible work of our staff and volunteers. By the way, we need more volunteers. When these new families come to SD, they need help in becoming acculturated to American life. Many have never seen supermarkets or have ever learned to drive. Our school system and healthcare system are a mystery. And our language, of course, is one of the biggest hurdles. Can you imagine moving to another country at this point in your life and having to adapt to a new culture? So volunteers, along with our great staff, provide a lot of invaluable help. 

You can help in a variety of ways. Volunteers are needed to mentor families and provide English tutoring, go bargain shopping to help furnish apartments, assist our case managers with filing, translation, and other administrative duties, and much more. For a complete list of volunteer opportunities, click here. If you’re interested in volunteering, give us a call at (858) 637-3366.