by Elaine Durbach
NJJN Bureau Chief/Central

August 20, 2009

Gordon Haas, genial and always seemingly relaxed, jokes that he and his wife, Yanina, are seldom seen at the same events. Talk to them about their weekly schedule and you can see why. Neither of them, they admit, is very good at saying “no.”

“Monday it’s usually the federation,” Gordon began, in a phone interview shared with his wife. He is cochair of the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Central New Jersey, heading it up for the seventh year. He serves on the federation’s community planning committee and the Ness committee of the Jewish Community Endowment Foundation.

He is also a vice president of the Jewish Family Service of Central New Jersey, and treasurer of the Elmora Synagogue of the Jewish Educational Center in Elizabeth — where he has also served as gabbai for the past 23 years.

That is all in addition to his professional position as founder, president, and chief executive officer of the Greater Elizabeth Chamber of Commerce and his volunteer positions as treasurer of the Elizabeth Development Corporation and chair of the Planning Board for the City of Elizabeth.

“I’m actually quite shy,” he claimed, to a gasp of disagreement from Yanina. But it’s true that for all his participation in dozens of meetings, Gordon is seldom the person making long speeches. “I prefer doing to talking,” he said.

“Tuesday is the sisterhood,” Yanina continued, as they argued over the calendar and then came to an agreement. She is president of that women’s group at the Elmora shul. Like Gordon, she is on the Central federation board. “We sit side by side,” he said, happy to cite a time when they can actually be together.

When their children, Shira and Chaim, were home, they said, one of them was always there in the evening. “We never hired a babysitter for weekday stuff,” Gordon said. As empty-nesters, things became more hectic.

After teaching for 23 years at the JEC, Yanina joined the staff at federation serving as Jewish education coordinator — in which capacity she helped develop the successful annual Leil Iyun, the Night of Jewish Learning. She then became director of the Women’s Campaign for 18 months.

As her professional role there ended, she again stepped up her volunteer work. “As an Orthodox Jew, I felt it was particularly important to give back to the federation,” she said.

Now she is working part-time as director of the L’Chaim Lifestyles Program for the AristaCare healthcare management company.

Through their federation roles and independently, they have been to Israel more times than they can count, often with delegations or missions — which raises the point that Gordon also serves on the New Jersey-Israel Commission. The couple has also been to Israel with their grandchildren.

That brings up a topic that ties it all together. They both kvell as they describe the way their offspring have continued this tradition of service, “running with it and taking it further than we ever did,” Gordon said. And now — and this delights them perhaps even more — Shira’s many children are getting involved with hesed, acts of kindness.

“That is so gratifying,” Yanina said. “It is the most, most wonderful feeling.”

‘We’ve been lucky’

Both Haases came from homes where service to the Jewish community was a given. In Yanina’s case, that was in Cincinnati, in a traditional Jewish home where all community visitors were welcome and treated like family. In Gordon’s case, it was an Orthodox home on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, where his father served as president of his shul for 28 years and as chairman of a yeshiva.

They met, through a friend of Yanina’s, at a home just around the corner from Gordon’s family’s apartment. Yanina, who as a teenager decided she wanted to lead an Orthodox life, was studying at Stern College. Gordon had been studying in Washington, DC. After just five dates, Gordon proposed. “And I accepted,” Yanina said. They married 18 months later, in 1969.

They came to Elizabeth that year, supposedly just for a year. But it turned out to be convenient for Gordon as he did his PhD in human anatomy at University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, and then taught the subject at various institutions, before switching in the early 1980s to computers.

They lived around the corner from the revered Rabbi Pinchas Teitz, founder of the JEC, and their family’s life revolved around the center. Yanina worked for Teitz, and then started her teaching. “When Rabbi Teitz asked you to do something, no one said ‘no,’” she said.

Elizabeth continued to serve them even when Gordon endured a five-year spell of unemployment after funding for his job was cut. In that time he worked as a volunteer for JFS, headquartered just blocks from their home. He said it helped him feel good about himself, and it gave him great empathy for what people are going through now.

“If I retired, I’d continue to do what I do but without a paycheck,” Gordon said. “I love it.” In fact, most of what he does is already that way. They say they count themselves blessed that they can give, both of their time and financially. “We’ve been very lucky,” Gordon said.

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