JFS in Your Community
2025 was a year to remember! For JFS, it was a year of connection and growth, of generosity and collaboration. As we look towards 2026, the staff at JFS are so thankful for the support we received this year and grateful that we can continue to serve and support our community members as they navigate life-changing events or times of everyday need.
JFS welcomes new Executive Director and CEO, Angela DeWilde: In April Angela DeWilde began her new role at JFS. Angela shared in our announcement, “I am honored to join JFS at a time when its mission is more important than ever,” DeWilde said, “and I am delighted to work alongside its amazing team and extraordinary partners to build on its legacy of success and impact serving both the Jewish community and those more broadly in need within our community.” Angela, we’re so happy you’re here!
JFS Executive Director & CEO Angela DeWilde in the JFS Kansas Food Pantry.
Party for the Pantry: We recognized 13 years of the JFS food pantry with a B’nai Mitzvah celebration! Our community came together by donating over 1,000 lbs of non perishable and personal care items to stock the pantry shelves, as well as generously supporting the JFS pantry by raising over $340,000 to help fund pantry programming year round.
JFS staff and volunteers helped sort donated food and personal care items during a community food collection on June 8th.
A Chilly Replacement: Every year, around 3,200 people count on the JFS food pantry for essential food, which includes lots of frozen produce and proteins. But after 13 years of faithful service, the freezer donated to the Kansas pantry gave out. The JFS Board challenged themselves and the community to raise $7,000 for a new freezer and nutritious frozen food for our clients. We are overjoyed that, not only was our goal met, it was exceeded!
JFS Board with new freezer in the Kansas pantry.
Training the next generation of Mental Health professionals:
We welcomed 5 new Social Work Interns to JFS! These students will be with us through the Spring of 2026. Clinical Interns are working on their second year of the Masters in Social Work Program. They support our Counseling and Mental Health Team by taking on individual clients, doing community outreach, and taking part in our mental health initiatives.
JFS mental health team during “Camp JFS” staff development day in September.
Honoring Holocaust Survivor Day — a day created in 2021 to recognize survivors, not just for what they endured, but for the lives they built and the wisdom they continue to share. Survivors joined JFS for an afternoon filled with music and remembrance. JFS was able to host this event with support from the Jewish Federation of Greater Kansas City and a grant from the Seed the Dream Foundation, in partnership with The Midwest Center for Holocaust Education. “It was a day of love, gratitude and remembrance — a celebration of life and legacy that we will always carry in our hearts,” shared Jana Fielder, JFS Director of Social Work Programming .
Holocaust survivors gathered in June to commemorate Holocaust Survivor Day with this year’s theme “Return to Life.”
Supporting the community in times of uncertainty: JFS staff, leadership, board members, and volunteers came together to pack up and distribute essential groceries to community members affected by the government shutdown, SNAP delays, or decreased food access. Thanks to generous donors and community partners Kanbe’s Markets and Avenue of Life, JFS was able to respond to the need quickly, distributing over 6,700 lbs of food during three drive-up events.
Volunteers loaded community members’ cars with boxes filled with shelf stable items, produce, protein, and self care items.
The JFS Hanukkah Project: Through our annual Hanukkah program, more than 300 Jewish clients received gift cards and items from individual wish lists. Volunteers of all ages joined together, amidst festive paper, bows, and many rolls of scotch tape, for our much-loved Hanukkah Wrapping Party, adding personal touches to clients’ gifts. Thank you to all the volunteers, adopters, donors, partners, and staff for brightening this holiday season for so many in our community!
Community members and Volunteers of all ages gathered to wrap Hanukkah gifts for over 300 individuals at the Hanukkah Wrapping Party in December.
Supporting the Spirit of the Community: Jewish life programming was active and inspiring in 2025. Jewish Community Chaplain, Rabbi Jonathan Rudnick and Lezlie Zucker, Music Coordinator at Congregation Beth Torah, lead three services of spiritual renewal to welcome the Passover, Rosh Hashanah, and Hanukkah Holidays. Spiritual care volunteers connected with community members 1,264 times including by phone and in-person visits.
Rabbi Jonathan Rudnick, Jewish Community Chaplain, lights the menorah for Hanukkah.
Working Together to make KC Thrive: Community partners were an integral part to broadening our reach in the Kansas City Community. Because of these important partnerships, JFS was able to more fully serve our clients and the community in a more wholistic way, caring for individuals and families and not just one specific need. Thank you to our partners for supporting JFS and working together to better our community.
JFS partner, Big 5 Trivia, hosted food drives around Kansas City during trivia nights and collected over 1,000 lbs of food to stock the JFS food pantry shelves.
THANK YOU to our Volunteers: We simply can’t do this work without the dedication and commitment of our incredible volunteers. Whether it’s delivering groceries, assisting food pantry shopping, visiting sick individuals, packing food boxes, driving an individual to an appointment, hosting a food drive, wrapping Hanukkah presents, the list is endless. Thank you to everyone who volunteered throughout 2025. We are so grateful for your time, efforts and care! THANK YOU!
Volunteers packing over 100 produce boxes for food distributions.
