Blog

Dear CBI Community:

Thanks very much to all who responded to the decision to end negotiations with Rabbi Ruhi.  We received 30 written comments from community members, and had multiple additional conversations, the vast majority of which were extremely supportive of the Board's decision.  We are grateful to hear from you. We also received a couple of comments from members who were concerned about the disclosure of details in the letter regarding this process. We appreciate the care and concern and would like to provide some additional clarification.

First, the entire Board holds the deepest respect for Rabbi Ruhi's spiritual and community leadership. We appreciate all that she gave to our community through her interview process, all of which resulted in a decision to offer her the position as lead rabbi. We also hold the same respect for Rabbi Ruhi's right to negotiate terms to the fullest extent to meet her and her family's needs.  This process ended because CBI could not meet her needs within CBI's fiscal constraints.  We worked hard to make it happen, as did she, until the Board came to the conclusion that it was not possible to reach an agreement without overextending ourselves now and into the future.

The content of our notice to the community was driven by the significance of this decision and a sense of responsibility, fueled by many members’ recent explicit request, to provide more information on Board decisions with greater transparency and immediacy.  Please know that we thought hard but necessarily fast, facing the dual obligation to inform Rabbi Ruhi immediately given her travel plans and to inform our community immediately given our commitment to timely and thorough communication. While we will continue to reflect on how to improve a process such as this, please know that our decisions were made with an acute effort to balance the respective needs involved.

We all feel fortunate to have had the chance to experience Rabbi Ruhi's special gifts as a spiritual leader, and know that any congregation, both now and in the future, will be so fortunate to have her as their rabbi.  Meanwhile, here at home, it is time to focus on the future of our rabbinic leadership and the financial challenges we face. We want to once again express our heartfelt gratitude to Rabbi Ariella for stepping into the role as our interim rabbi for these next 6 months.  Her steady and skilled leadership is a gift to us all. 

We look forward to being in touch in early September regarding planning for our community’s next steps towards a permanent lead rabbi at CBI.  Wishing you a healthy and lovely end of summer.

Shabbat Shalom,
Barbara and Pamela on behalf of the CBI Board