Meeting the challenges of an aging community

When the Jewish Home at Home approached Bonim Builders last summer to help a client, the group sprang into action, mobilizing volunteers to retrofit a home for a woman who had recently suffered a stroke and was no longer able to walk.

As the 64-year-old – a patient at the Jewish Home’s Sub-Acute Rehabilitation Center – prepared to return home to her center hall colonial, Susan Lilly, the Jewish Home at Home’s director of geriatric care, told Bonim coordinator Stacey Orden that time was of the essence, since it was not clear when the woman’s medical insurance company would order her discharge.

Within a week, Bonim, a project of the Synagogue Leadership Initiative of the Jewish Federation of Northern New Jersey, evaluated the home, drew up plans, and began the necessary work. Within three weeks, wrought iron railings were installed from the garage to the kitchen, with another two rails installed on the steps inside the kitchen; and the existing banister, with new brackets, was reinstalled.

Said Lilly, Bonim’s achievement was “a clear example of tikkun olam and the power of two sister agencies joining together to get the job done.”