First Jewish Senior Citizens Center To Open in Russia

(lubavitch.com) On Wednesday June 2, several hundred Jewish community members participated at a historic groundbreaking in Vladimir, Russia, where the first Jewish senior citizens center in about 90 years is slated to open.

According to Rabbi Boruch Gorin, elderly Jews living in Russia today have no options for a respectable senior citizens center. The last time the Jewish community had such facilities, he says, was pre-revolution. “People are afraid to wind up in state-run nursing homes,” where the care is typically poor. The new senior citizens center, says Gorin, will serve as a prototype “for many more that we hope will be built in Russia.”

An important development, he explains, especially for a population that has served the Jewish community and the country so well “during its dark years.” Today, many of them survive without family to care for them, and “this is a small way that we can reciprocate.”

The center is to be established at the Lekko Industrial Park in Vladimir, where bio-engineers will be developing new medicines. Lekko’s Chairman of the Board of Directors, Alexander Schuster, is the major sponsor of the project. After recognizing the dearth in good care for the elderly, he consulted with leading members of the FJC, and developed the idea for this project.

“I’ve participated in many philanthropic projects, but I now see that it’s in my power to do something on a much larger scale.”

Vice Governor of the Vladimir Region, Vladimir Veretenikov participated at the groundbreaking along with FJC Chief Rabbi Berel Lazar, Rabbi Alexander Boroda, President of the FJC.

The center is set to open in 12-18 months