The Board of Directors
Daniel Seligman
I have a degree in religious studies from McGill University, which is where I first met our spiritual leader Rachel Kronick, back in the 1990s, and i have been involved with MECh in one way or another since it began over 10 years ago. I am deeply connected to the Montreal cultural and music scene and I am eager to use my experience in organizing events and working within the diverse landscape of the Montreal arts scene towards helping MECh continue to grow as an important community institution in Montreal.
Dan is a music manager, most notably for Jewish hip hop wizard Socalled. He is a co-founder of the POP Montreal Music Festival and is the festival’s creative director
Hilary Leftick
Despite living in Ottawa, I have strong roots in Montreal and have a special place in my heart for the Chavurah. I have the time and feel I could be a good contributing member. For many years I was the ED of POP Montreal where I led on sponsorship, fundraising and partnerships. In 2014, I became Director of volunteer mobilization at the Liberal Party, my program saw over 80, 000 volunteers active across the country. Recently, I worked in the Prime Minister’s office as the Director of Public Appointments. I developed a passion for governance and oversaw appointments for all federal boards, agencies and institutions. This included performance evaluation and HR policy. I met people from all across the country, working both within and outside the government and have a wide breadth of contacts. I’m also a member of POP Montreal and the Maurice Pollack Foundation (both in Montreal). I would like to serve on the board as I have a deep respect for what the Chavurah does. Making jewish culture and traditions accessible is something I did not have growing up and I think it’s a wonderful thing.
Luna Woolf
Together with her family, Luna has been an active member of the Mile End Chavurah for more than 8 years, engaging with the JEDI and B-Mitz programs, as well as many other activities. She is honoured to be joining the board at this exciting time in the evolution of our warm and remarkable community.
Luna is a composer, dramaturg, recording producer and music publisher. Her works in opera and contemporary music have been nominated for GRAMMY, JUNO and Dora awards, and she has produced recordings for the PENTATONE, Atma, Analekta and Leaf labels. As dramaturg and teacher she has collaborated with Musique 3 Femmes, the National Theater School of Canada and others. An innovator in the Classical music recording industry, she is President and co-founder of Oxingale Productions, Inc., a boutique label and music publisher.
Karl Ponthieux Stern
I am a writer, a gay trans activist and a French Jew. My experience in community organizing comes from previous involvements in a wide variety of initiatives, such as queer advocacy, prevention of antisemitism, and workers´ rights. I hope that my ‘outsider’ perspective, both as a francophone in a largely anglophone space and as a recent arrival in Canada and Montréal, can add to the diversity of the MECh community. I am very grateful to the MECh members for this opportunity to serve on our board of directors.
Karl is an international student in the MA program at Concordia. Their research « ExisTransInter : faire l´histoire des personnes trans à travers leur activisme » is based on an Oral History of a yearly demonstration led by trans activists since 1997. They also used to be an accountant and a team manager in an audit firm.
Noelle Sorbara
I’ve spent the past two decades working at the intersection of entrepreneurship, social activism, and leadership development. I am a lawyer by training and a community builder by nature. I am a founder of Pop Montreal and Welcome Collective, and served as the first executive director for both of those organizations. I have been an advisor/board member to several nonprofits, including Apathy is Boring for seven years, and Mile End Legal Clinic. I have a passion for building, restructuring and evolving social enterprises whose missions I believe in.
My most recent project draws on my training as a somatic practitioner and my studies in Buddhist philosophy to evolve a model of leadership development that focuses on personal and emotional exploration and growth. The goal of the work is to support those in positions of power to learn how to respond to challenging issues in a mindful and non-reactive manner.
I’m interested in working with the Mile End Chavurah because I am drawn to the community, its mission, and its incredible potential to support a progressive and inclusive faith-based community.
Rebecca Hamilton
I am a newer member of the Chavurah, having mainly attended High Holy Days services the last few years, and I am very grateful that it exists! This year, I am teaching the MECh JEDI B~Mitzvah class, and I am interested in serving on the board because so I can contribute to and learn from the broader community.
I study part-time at McGill and am a leader at McGill Chavurah: a student group with a similar democratic, progressive, and community-centred Jewish ethos to MECh. The intergenerationality of MECh is meaningful to me, and I’d be excited to help build bridges between our chavurot. I grew up attending and working at Habonim Dror Camp Miriam in BC, which got me excited about social justice-connected Jewish community and self-governance. For the last six years I have been heavily involved in climate and economic justice organizing in a variety of grassroots and non-profit roles, including: event planning, finance, fundraising, strategic planning, grassroots organizational development, and facilitation.
Currently, I am involved in building out a distributed volunteer leadership structure in an economic justice organization, aiming to redistribute work which has fallen to one staff person; I’d love to bring lessons from this work to MECh.
Renata Militzer
I’m pretty excited about getting involved in MECh organizing again! I’ve been a member since 2017 and participated in the Shabbat, social justice, and HH committees.
The recent events in I-P make me want to dig even deeper into my Judaism and especially with a community that aligns with my values. I love the intergenerational, participatory events we host and I want to make sure they continue to happen!
I’m a social worker by trade and a community organizer by passion: over the past 20 years I’ve been involved with a number of orgs in Montreal working around food security, gender-based violence and advocacy with LGBTQI+ migrants. Through this work I’ve learned about collective decision-making, event planning, yearly org work plan development, volunteer and staff team leadership, HR and fundraising.
Some of my ideas on how to strengthen the Chavurah: A period of strategic planning; updating policies; rekindling committees; securing additional funding to increase staff hours. And if there’s interest, I’d love to see a LGBTQI+ group.
It’s exciting that the Chavurah is entering a phase of growth. There are so many wonderfully talented people in this community, I feel pretty confident that together we’ll be able to strengthen the Chavurah!
Sara Laimon
Sara Laimon and her family – Jonathan, Rachel and Toby Kimmelman – have been longstanding members of Mile End Chavurah though they live in NDG. Rachel had the honour of being the first Bat Mitzvah of the Chavurah in 2012; what a joy to see how many Bnei Mitzvot have followed! Rachel and Toby for many years offered an arrangement of Kol Nidrei I made for them when they were very young; Rachel left to study in Halifax and Toby is carrying on the tradition. Outside of the Chavurah Sara is Professor of Piano at McGill’s Schulich School of Music, and for 7 years served as Director of the (now closed) McGill Conservatory of Music. Originally from Vancouver, she arrived in Montreal (via 14 years in the United States, and one year in Winnipeg!) in Fall of 2001. She joined the board initially as a replacement but remained on the board eventually serving 2 years as co-chair with Dan Levy prior to sabbatical away in 2023-24. Sara has enjoyed working with the Social Justice Action committee, the High Holidays committee and hopes to rejoin the newly energized board and contribute to the sustainability of MECh.
Val Shamash
I am a Mile End Iraqi Jew and have been a member of MECh for many years. I have always been grateful to have access to this inclusive Jewish++ community when my small family of my daughter and myself needed it. Finding that I am now wishing to lean into community, and ready to give back locally, I would be happy if I could help keep things flowing for the MECh community.
I have a Master’s Degree in anthropology and have been working in documentary film (and sometimes fiction) production for over 20 years. I feel strongly about the importance of appreciating cross-cultural differences, and I’m excited to use my professional experience as a member of the board!
Board Alumni
Adam Bright
Adam Sargon
Andrea Robbins
Anique Vered
Auriel Manolson
Ben Yunis
Benji Loomer
Cara Leibovitz
Carine Elkouby
Dan Levy
Diana Yaros
Elizabeth Moorhouse-Stein
Erica Lehrer
Eva Margo-Dermer
Genvieève Nevin
Gueula Rabkin
Isaac Stethem
Jacqueline Celemencki
Joseph Rosen
Julia Appel
Layla Dabby
Leah Vineberg
Lisa Goldman
Melanie Leavitt
Mindy Stricke
Myrite Rotstein
Nancy Rotman
Peter Horowitz
Rachel K
Rimma Orenman
Rodney Handelsman
Ruth Wikler
Samara Yesovitch
Sara Laimon
Sarah Leila Manolson
Saul Carliner
Shira Gilbert
Sofia Danna
Stephanie Marchal
Steve McFadden
Steven Schnoor
Tamara Kramer
Vera Kisfalvi
Yaakov Stern