- 617-277-6610
- Email Us
TO: Board of Directors, Temple Ohabei Shalom
FROM: Nominating Committee: Benjamin Berkowitz, Chair; Rachel Greene
DATE: May 1, 2024
The Nominating Committee is very pleased to present this slate to the TOS Board. Many of those nominated have served TOS with such dedication in the past and you all are committed to moving our congregation forward. Those whom will be joining for the board for the first time bring great experience and expertise to the Board, and together, this slate represents the diversity of our congregation.
Benjamin Berkowitz immediate past President chaired the Nominating Committee with Rachel Greene serving as member at large on the Committee. The Committee met several times over the past two months, and we consulted with numerous persons, including Mark Gale as President, the clergy, Natasha Goldman as incoming president, and senior employees of TOS.
| Member: | Term Ending | Role |
| Natasha Goldman | 2027 | President |
| Josh Paradise | 2025 | Treasurer |
| Denise Karlin | 2025 | Recording Secretary |
| Alisa Kahn Ridruejo | 2025 | |
| Nick Hunter | 2027 | |
| Ted Feldman | 2027 | |
| Rachel Miller Munzer | 2027 | |
| Michelle Simon | 2027 | |
| Leigha Cuniberti | 2026 | |
| Jeff Berry | 2025 | |
| Richard Stern | 2025 | |
| Elliott Puretz | 2025 | |
| Fawn Phelps | 2026 | |
| Stephanie Kohn | 2026 | |
| Jonathan Kerner | 2026 | |
Some additional notes: Under the By-Laws, the Board will be determining who should be serving as Vice Presidents for each of the areas defined in the By-Laws. We are confident that we have nominated among the Trustees persons more than capable of serving each of the VP positions. Based on conversations with Natasha, we did not fill the president elect position, but added an extra 1 year position. In the 2025 nomination process, the expectation is that Natasha will be involved in helping to select a successor in an official capacity as President Elect.
The slate will be presented at the Annual Congregational Meeting, which is scheduled for early June. We are fully confident that the slate will be welcomed with open arms by the congregants. Terms will begin on July 1 through June 30th for the years listed above.
On behalf of the Nominating Committee, we respectfully submit this slate for consideration by the TOS Board for further presentation to the Congregation during the annual meeting.
L’Shalom,
Benjamin Berkowitz
Chair, TOS Nominating Committee
TOS Nominating Committee:
Benjamin Berkowitz
Rachel Greene
Natasha Goldman, PhD and her family, including her husband Joachim Homann and sons Tobias and Adam, moved to Brookline in 2019 and joined Temple Ohabei Shalom in 2020. Adam became a bar mitzvah at TOS in 2023. Natasha’s family had lived in Brunswick, ME for nine years, where they were active in the local Brunswick Havurah and members of Congregation Bet Ha’am in South Portland. On the professional front, Natasha is an art historian and president of WISSEN, Inc., a grants consulting firm that works with hospitals, municipalities, and institutions of higher education. She is also a visiting researcher at the Elie Wiesel Center for Jewish Studies at Boston University, where her research focuses Holocaust memorials. Her book, Memory Passages: Holocaust Memorials in the United States and Germany, was published by Temple University Press in 2020. She has twice co-directed a National Endowment for the Humanities summer seminar, “Teaching the Holocaust through Visual Culture,” at Bowdoin College for teachers grades 8-12 from across the US.
Joshua lives in Brookline with his wife, Masha Kogan and their son, Toby. They have been members of Ohabei Shalom since Toby started pre-school at the Trust Center in 2012. Professionally, Joshua is a consultant, strategist, and investment analyst in sustainability and renewable energy.
Denise J. Karlin is an attorney who retired in 2022 from a 36 career with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts where she was Legal Counsel for the Massachusetts Department of Early Education and Care for 22 years and Complaint Counsel for the Board of Registration in Medicine for 14 years. Denise is a graduate of Harvard College and Havard Law School. Denise and her husband Bill Jarosz have been members of Temple Ohabei Shalom since 2010. Denise has served on the Temple’s Board of Trustees since 2012, serving as Recording Secretary since 2023. She has also served as President of the TOS Sisterhood since 2016. Denise has also served on numerous Temple committees over the years, both standing and ad hoc committees, and currently serves on the Finance, Human Resources, and Adult Education committees. Denise is also active with the Massachusetts Bar Foundation, where she serves as a Fellow, and serves as a Trustee on the Board of the Brook House Condominium Trust. Denise and Bill have lived in Brookline for over 40 years (together for 37 of those years). They live with their 16 year old miniature poodle Luna, and their 12 year old cat Tony.
With 24 year of experience in Marketing and Business Development for local architectural firms, Alisa currently works at studioMLA Architects in Brookline Village. A Brookline resident for 16 years and mother of a 9-year-old son, she is active on the Runkle School PTO helping with the Annual Fund and popular events such as the Halloween Fair. Other former longtime volunteer positions include serving on the alumni boards of The Winsor School and Wesleyan University among others. She and her family enjoy biking, skiing, sailing, cooking, volunteering and hosting parties!
Nick Hunter and his wife, Helen, joined Temple Ohabei Shalom in 2015. Their son Nat (6th grade) and daughter Anna (3nd grade) both attended preschool at the Trust Center for Early Education and are now students at the Ansin Religious School. Nick especially values the sense of community he finds at TOS and is always amazed by the musical talent heard at every service. Nick was born and raised in the suburbs of Seattle, WA. He moved to Boston twenty years ago to attend graduate school at Harvard. He has lived within a mile of TOS ever since, the last ten in Coolidge Corner. By the time he finished his Ph.D. in neurobiology he knew that his real interest lay in teaching. He loves his job heading the science department at a small, majority Jewish, private school in Wellesley, MA where he teaches high school physics and 8th grade science.
Ted Feldman hails from Port Jefferson Station, NY. He grew up going to Temple Isaiah in Stony Book, NY and has many fond memories of the Temple as a second home (his mom was the religious school admin for a stretch so he was there a lot). He came up to the Boston area for grad school in 2007 and never left. He is a data scientist and investigator at the VA Boston Healthcare System and a Lecturer in the Department of Biomedical Informatics at Harvard Medical School. His work spans improving oncology care for Veterans under the Cancer Moonshot, identifying cancer therapy toxicity, understanding the relationship and progression of chronic liver disease to liver cancer and has included helping in the VA Boston response to the COVID-19 Pandemic. He earned a B.S. in Physics and B.E. in Engineering Science from Stony Brook University and an S.M. and Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Harvard University. You’ve seen him around TOS volunteering at the Muddy River clean-up, a few different TOS Young Adult events and playing the flute and sax in the TOS Band. In addition to music he enjoys cooking, biking (he still needs to lead a TOS ice cream ride) and running and ran the 2017 Marine Corps, 2019 NYC and 2022 Chicago Marathons with Berlin planned for 2024. He started tap dancing last year. Ted resides in Somerville where he serves as the Secretary and Engineering Team Lead of the Somerville Bicycle Advisory Committee.
Richard Stern grew up in Charleston SC, attending Sunday School at the US’s oldest Reform Temple, followed by attending middle school at Addlestone Hebrew Academy. He remains involved with his Southern Jewish roots via participation in The Jewish Historical Society of SC and the College of Charleston’s Jewish Studies program.
After graduating from the University of Florida, Richard moved to Atlanta to begin his accounting career with the largest regional CPA firm in Atlanta. Nearly a decade later, he founded Richard H Stern CPA PC, a tax and consulting firm, which recently celebrated 20 years of service.
In 2013, Richard and his Partner, Dr. Lance Goodman relocated to the South End section of Boston, where Richard quickly became involved in several non-profit organizations, including United South End Settlements (USES) and South End Business Alliance (SEBA). Lance and Richard became a members of TOS in 2014, followed by Richard joining the TOS Board of Directors in 2017.
