Jacksonville's Jewish Community Alliance named best of North American peers

The Jewish Community Alliance in Jacksonville, which provides physical, recreational, educational, social and cultural opportunities for all faiths, outshined its peers in all of North America in a recent survey.

The Manhattan-based Jewish Community Centers Association of North America conducted a third-party survey of its membership in 2023. The results showed that the Jacksonville center, which opened in 1988, had the highest customer satisfaction rate and was the friendliest, most engaged and frequently visited.

"The energy … on campus is palpable," said association spokesman Todd Rockoff, CEO of the Tucson Jewish Community Center. The center's membership growth is "higher than the trend throughout the country," he said. "Where many Jewish Community Centers are still working their way back from the drop during the pandemic, the JCA has the highest member retention in the nation."

The survey results "put a big smile on my face," CEO Adam Chaskin said. They show "how people feel about us" and confirm the center is "headed in the right direction," he said.

Among other benchmarks, the center was first in its peer group for average programs per member, at 2.8, and for members using at least three programs, at 54%. About 76% of its members surveyed called the center's program quality "truly outstanding," the second highest in the peer group.

Located on San Jose Boulevard, the center has about 215 year-round staff and 2,600 household members, which translates to about 8,000 people, Chaskin said. About 60% are non-Jewish.

Andrea Seebol Smithers has lifelong family ties to the center. Her grandparents were founding members, her parents and their children made regular visits and she, husband Ben and their children are doing the same.

"We go there all the time," she said. "I wanted to give my kids the same sense of community and belonging that my parents and grandparents gave me."

Smithers remembers swimming at the center with her grandfather and taking babysitting and CPR courses. As an adult, she favors the gym, yoga classes and sauna and enrolled her children in the center's preschool.

Meanwhile, the center's citywide unity push with the First Coast YMCA continues. And the center has raised about $13.8 million for its $18 million capital campaign that will fund campus-wide improvements expected to be complete by late 2025, according to Chaskin.

The upgrades include adding pickleball courts, splash park and an outdoor exercise area, as well as adding classrooms, heating the pool and making "behind-the-scenes" improvements to the center's theater, he said.

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"Every part of the building is being touched," he said. "We've been an integral part of the community for 36 years. We want to make sure we have the facilities to continue to be an integral part of the community."

The center rose from the 1983 closure of Beauclerc Country Club, which donated $2 million in assets and about 7 acres for a Jewish community center, according to a 2013 Times-Union report.

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This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Jacksonville's Jewish Community Alliance named best in North America