Derek Saker
Director of Communications
OHEL Children’s Home and Family Services
dsaker@ohelfamily.org
718-686-3333 direct | 347 920 0199 mobile | 718 851 2772 fax
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OHEL Annual Gala 2012 —Theme: Cherish the Children
February 12, 2012
Honorees Announced

Moishe Hellman, President of OHEL Children’s Home and Family Services, announced that the agency’s Annual Gala will be held on Sunday, February 12, 2012 at the New York Hilton Hotel, NYC. The gala event kicks off with a Reception at 5:00 pm, followed by Dinner at 6:00 pm. The focus of this year’s Dinner is OHEL’s Cherish the Children campaign. 

OHEL—and its many friends and supporters—are committed to the fundamental principle that every child deserves to be cherished. For more than forty-two years, OHEL has provided critical programs and services to help ensure that children are protected, well cared for, loved and encouraged to thrive. OHEL foster families, its domestic abuse shelters, summer camp, programs for the siblings of children with developmental disabilities, and its residential facilities are just some of the many ways in which OHEL has cherished our community’s children for more than four decades. 

Support for the Annual Gala will give children with developmental disabilities the opportunity to attend summer camp alongside their typically developing peers; respite and support to the parents of children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders; access to the best medical care for children living with OHEL foster families; among many other important programs and services.

OHEL is proud to share this special evening with deserving Honorees. Annual Gala Honorees this year have demonstrated an exemplary commitment to cherishing and elevating the lives of people of all ages and are among OHEL’s most loyal friends and supporters. This year’s Corporate Guests of Honor are Bollinger Insurance, Inc and Andrew Marks, Senior Executive VP and Bruce Tindal, Executive VP.  Established in 1933, Bollinger, Inc. is headquartered in Short Hills, NJ. Currently ranked as the nation’s 17th largest insurance broker, the company has more than 450 employees. Named one of the 2009 Best Places to Work in Insurance, Bollinger provides business and personal insurance and employee benefit programs to a wide range of customers, as well as specialty insurance programs for golf and country clubs, amateur sports and schools and colleges.

The Gala also pays tribute to the memory of Rita Baratz, A’H, proud mother of Philip and Lisa Baratz, David and Tzippora Baratz, Michael and Ellen Baratz, and Sammy and Rachellie Baratz.  Rita and her husband Joe served as exemplary OHEL foster parents to many children in need of safe shelter and a loving home. Many are now grown with families of their own, and their former foster children have maintained close ties with the family. The Baratz children experienced first-hand how OHEL and a loving foster family can create a childhood to be cherished. Phil and Lisa and Michael and Ellen stem from Hollywood Florida; David & Tzippora live in West Hempstead NY; and Sammy and Rachellie reside in Woodmere, NY. All are active in their communities. The Baratz family recognizes the impact and importance of OHEL’s foster care program and is proud, as OHEL Honorees, to remember and pay tribute to their mothers’ generosity, love and hard work.

Patrick, I. Borgen, M.D. will be honored with OHEL’s Humanitarian Award at the Annual Gala.  Dr. Patrick I. Borgen has cared with kindness for many people in our community and is highly respected and admired for his acts of charity. Dr. Borgen is Chair of the Department of Surgery at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York. He also heads the Brooklyn Breast Cancer Program at  Maimonides Cancer Center, the only dedicated cancer center in Brooklyn. Dr. Borgen was recruited from Memorial Sloan Kettering where he served as Chief of Breast Services, Head of the Breast Cancer Research Laboratory and Director of the Breast Cancer Disease Management Team.

Assemblyman Gary S. Schaer of Passaic/Essex/Bergen NJ will be recognized at the OHEL Dinner Gala with the “Legislator of the Year” Award. Assemblyman Schaer has served in the NJ General Assembly since January 2006. Over the course of his service in the Legislature, Assemblyman Schaer has successfully championed numerous legislative accomplishments and won many victories for the residents of the 36th District and New Jersey.   He has also written laws that require employers to provide time off for religious holidays, and that require alternative testing dates for students taking standardized tests and professionals such as attorneys or doctors taking a test for state licensure, among others measures. Currently, he is drafting legislation that would require the NJ Department of Children and Families to place foster and adopted children in homes that match a child’s religious heritage. He also is in discussions with stakeholders to ensure cemeteries do not gouge grieving families when burial must happen on a secular holiday or Sunday. 

Assemblyman Schaer is known for his leadership on a variety of issues including greater assistance for families, children and adults with Autism and developmental disabilities, property tax relief and reform, strengthening ethics laws, funding for New Jersey’s public colleges and bringing increased fiscal responsibility to New Jersey’s budget.  He is active in many local causes in the Passaic NJ area.

OHEL Bais Ezra, the Lifetime Care Foundation and Camp Kaylie have served thousands in the community for more than four decades.  While, the needs of the Jewish community have continued to grow and change since OHEL’s founding in 1969, it continues to meet our community’s evolving needs with the highest quality programs and services. The Annual Gala is OHEL’s most important fundraising event of the year. Many of its programs receive little or no government funding, and OHEL relies on the participation of its generous friends and supporters to ensure that OHEL can continue to elevate the lives of thousands of individuals and families every day. Gifts to the 2012 Annual Gala and Journal will support OHEL’s Cherish the Children Campaign.