- [Narrator] Funding for this edition of One-On-One with Steve Adubato has been provided by The Russell Berrie Foundation.

Making a difference.

Holy Name Medical Center.

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The Turrell Fund, supporting Reimagine Childcare.

TD Bank.

United Airlines.

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Seton Hall University.

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The Fidelco Group.

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And by Fedway Associates, Inc.

Promotional support provided by NJ on Air.

And by ROI-NJ, informing and connecting businesses in New Jersey.

- This is One-On-One.

- I'm an equal American just like you are.

- The jobs of tomorrow are not the jobs of yesterday.

- Look at this.

You get this?

- Life without dance is boring.

- I don't care how good you are or how good you think you are, there is always something to learn.

- Do you enjoy talking politics?

- No.

- People call me 'cause they feel nobody's paying attention.

- Our culture, I don't think has ever been tested in the way it's being tested right now.

- That's a good question, high five.

(upbeat music) - Hi, I'm Steve Adubato.

A very special edition of this program where we meet two people who I actually met.

I was on location.

We had a great tour and did a great video initiative, but we're remote now.

And they are in fact Toba and Rabbi Zalman Grossbaum, founders of Friendship Circle and LifeTown, which is in fact where you are right now.

You're at LifeTown, right?

- Yes.

Welcome to LifeTown.

We wish this place was buzzing with kids but we're glad to meet you here today.

- Rabbi, make LifeTown come alive for everyone.

Again, I was fortunate enough with our video crew to get to see it firsthand, but what is it and why does it matter so much?

- Just last September we had the grand opening for this center.

And what we're sitting in right now is an indoor city where individuals with special needs can learn life skills in a real setting.

And from September until March when the COVID hit, this place was buzzing.

We had schools coming from throughout the state and beyond to use this as part of their educational curriculum.

And we look forward very soon hopefully to welcome everyone back again.

- Well, you know, as we talk about this I'm going to ask our video team to roll some video from the mini documentary we actually did on LifeTown to make it come alive for people since we can't be there in person.

But Toba, let me ask you this.

The rabbi talks about the impact of COVID.

What impact has COVID had on your ability also to raise money as a not-for-profit.

Help us.

- So the challenge, you know, of COVID hit everybody, but for our families and for parents who are challenged with some of them, with even more than one child with special needs, it took on a whole 'nother world.

The isolation, the self care, some of our families still have not even gone back to any kind of in-person and the remote learning doesn't work for a lot of our population.

So this has made the challenge so much more difficult for our families than anyone else dealing with this pandemic.

- The other reality is raising money.

Now you've been very creative and innovative.

I'm a fan of that because we have to be, particularly in the not-for-profit world.

You've led parades and something called a carnival.

- Yes.

So thank God, we've been very fortunate.

Our friends have been there for us.

The Federation has stepped up to help us financially so that we could continue offering as many programs as we can.

We've been doing a lot of outdoor events, carnivals where the families come and ride by in their car and to their window they are brought activities like shooting, the dunking the person in the tank and carnival games galore each step of the way while they remained in their car and socially safe.

We've done several of those on Sundays and lots and lots of Zoom and outdoor programs while the weather was nice.

- Rabbi, put this in perspective for us.

You and Toba representing your organization, are the winners of the 2018 Russ Berrie Making a Difference Award.

And that's how we met you.

One of the great things about this is an initiative called 25 for 25, where we feature 25 Russ Berrie Making a Difference Award awardees, winners, if you will, over the past 25 years, which I'm going to tell you has not been easy, because to put things in perspective, $3.5 million in cash awards over these 25 years.

366 New Jersey's most dedicated citizens have been honored with this prestigious award.

You remember back to 2018 when you won the award?

What did it mean then and what does it mean now, Rabbi?

- Sitting there at the luncheon and in the energy in the room, listening to the other honorees, how they were innovative in their community's challenge and rising to that challenge to create something unique that never existed before.

Thinking out of the box, that was really the energy that we felt that day.

And that's what COVID presented.

You know, we were so based on our in-person program, based on our teen volunteers, adult volunteers, over 1000 volunteers with LifeTown in the center.

All the programs, the schools coming to the center.

So COVID turned everything upside down.

But from the very first day that we closed this building we were on Zoom.

We were offering virtual programs.

For our cooking programs we sent full kits.

We've been doing that for the past eight months, sending full kits to the homes.

Same thing for the art programs, trying to be innovative.

So it really caused us to reach deep within us, to figure out who we really are.

You know, as a rabbi, when we founded this organization we founded it based on the biblical concept (foreign language) love your fellow as yourself.

And if that is the guiding principle, the circumstance might change, but the soul and the energy of what this is all about never changes.

It just makes us, forces us to be more creative and to go and to really reach deeper within us to find creative ways to express that.

- Well said, Rabbi.

Toba, let me ask you this.

If someone wanted to know, who do you serve?

Who do you serve?

- We try to be there for every family in time of need.

And that has always been our model.

And we try to be there as much as we possibly can.

We've been doing a lot of home visits with trucks.

We did a firetrucks parade, driving through every town and showering the kids with music and clowns.

And so whatever we can, whenever we can.

- What do parents need Toba?

- For the parents, it has been, as we mentioned before, so challenging, so we've actually been doing so many online programs.

The online programs work great for the parents.

So at night, once their kids are in bed we've been offering Zoom programs, support programs.

Next in two weeks, we're going to be doing a spa event for all the moms where they get a full care package with a little, you know, a little l'chaim as we say, you know.

- Well, wait a minute, hold on.

Which means what?

- That they are for us for an hour and a half to relax at night, they have a full program brought to them, a full care package.

They've got a Zoom in with their other moms that they may have not seen in person and encourage each other, use words of inspiration.

And they're going to do a online activity together and you know, forced to do it a different way.

- Rabbi, we're talking a lot about LifeTown, but the Friendship Circle.

Is there a branding issue?

Like, is there a difference?

Help us understand that.

We have a minute left.

- We started the Friendship Circle 21 years ago.

We initially focused on the Jewish community to offer Hebrew schools and other Judaic programming to those families.

But we always knew that we need to expand beyond the Jewish community.

That's what LifeTown allowed.

All the Friendship Circle programs still have a Jewish focus on them, but all of the LifeTown programming that we're ramping up and that we will continue to ramp up is open to the general public.

And everyone's welcome to be a part of it.

And that's what was so beautiful about what was happening here.

What continues to happen.

Outdoor somebody joked, he said, "Rabbi, after building such a beautiful building, who would have thought your greatest asset would be your parking lot?"

- It's a great parking lot.

It really is, I've been there.

But one of the things Rabbi and Toba.

I want to thank you and remind everyone that you are the founders of Friendship Circle and LifeTown, an extraordinary place.

By the way, LifeTown located in.

- Livingston, New Jersey.

But actually one of the things we're doing now is we're taking LifeTown virtual.

We were almost rolling, we're just about ready to roll out a virtual experience, immersive experience for teachers because one of the challenges has happened in the special education world has been the disconnect from teachers to their students remotely.

So this immersive program where they're both virtually in this space and every room that they walk into, they have icons and other things, videos, interactive games, educational parts.

So it's all about being creative and creating opportunities.

It's a COVID rainbow if you might call it.

- Well, well said, Rabbi.

I'll say that again, and Toba, thank you.

Thank both of you for adding to this very important 25 for 25 initiative.

Thanks for both of you.

All the best.

- Thank you.

- Thank you so much.

All the best.

Yeah.

I'm Steve Adubato, we'll be right back.

- [Narrator] To watch more One on One with Steve Adubato find us online and follow us on Social media.

- We are now joined by Adam Lowy, who is Executive Director and Founder of Move For Hunger.

Good to see you Adam.

- Good to see you too, Steve.

- Let everybody know what Move For Hunger is and why it matters so much.

- So Move For Hunger is a national non-profit organization that works to leverage transportation resources to rescue food and deliver it to food banks.

We're working with more than 1000 moving companies and 1500 apartments across the US and Canada, and collectively I've fed over 17 million people.

- It's interesting, you won the... You and your organization won the 2016, Russ Berrie Making a Difference Awards.

And when I first read about the organization I thought, wow, that's an innovative, creative idea.

Did Adam Lowy come up with that?

Did you?

- Me and my family, I won't take full credit, but my family has had a moving company here in New Jersey for about a 100 years.

And we saw so many people throwing away food or leaving it behind when they moved, that we started asking people if they wanted to donate it.

And it turns out that if you make it really easy for people to take action, they will.

- How great is the need?

Describe it.

- You know, pre-COVID, there were 37 million Americans that didn't have enough to eat.

And as a result of this pandemic, we're expected to see the need increase by another 17 million Americans.

So all the progress that we've seen in terms of food insecurity over the past decade have been more than wiped away.

And while hunger continues to be a pressing problem for our country, food waste also is.

A third of the food produced globally ends up in landfills, but here in the US it's actually 40%.

We're a pretty bad actor in terms of food waste.

So to me, and to the work that our organization does, this is a lot about the logistics of getting food to where it needs to go and to help people in need before it reaches landfills.

- Adam, why don't we in our country, in the United States waste more food than others?

- You know, it happens for a variety of reasons.

It starts at, you know, at the farm level when crops are growing and sometimes it's just labor needs, being able to get that food harvested.

Sometimes the cost doesn't make sense.

Sometimes our government is subsidizing the wrong crops versus the right crops.

Then you get to the grocery stores and, you know, you've probably seen the shiny apple on the shelf but you don't always see the dented apple or the one with the little blemish.

- Why?

- That's because that food is thrown away or chopped to fit in some standard packaging.

And then you get to the date labels, which say best by, use by, expires on, all kinds of arbitrary dates that don't actually know when your food is going to waste.

And then finally in the home, in the restaurant whether it's your portion size, or you chop that pepper that you think you're gonna use in a couple of days, and you forget to freeze it.

All of these things are costing people, companies, farmers, money.

And I think at the end of the day what we're gonna see is it makes sense to invest in ways to bring food loss to a minimum because it will actually raise the money we get to keep in our wallets, the money the farmers and the restaurants have.

It makes good financial sense not to waste food.

But more importantly, we don't want this food ending up in a landfill, or creating greenhouse gases which contributes to climate change.

- You know, you talked about how COVID has impacted the people you're serving everyday.

How has COVID impacted your organization as a nonprofit?

- Yeah, you know, like many organizations in March, we were worried, are we gonna be able to keep our doors open and continue to work to meet the need.

Many of our food banking partners here in New Jersey and all across the country are seeing 10 times, 20 times the need they ever had before.

I mean, people are visiting food banks for the first time in their lives, and we don't really see that slowing down.

We're very fortunate that a number of foundations here in New Jersey and across the country stepped in to help us not only have some breathing room but to continue to be innovative and creative to tackle this problem.

So we actually pivoted some of our operations focusing less on food drives during this time and more on big bulk food recoveries and teaming up with leading organizations.

We've teamed up with some farmers here, New Jersey Farmers Against Hunger, has been a great organization we've been working with to rescue some food from.

Russ Berrie has been, you know, their foundation has put us in touch with a number of organizations locally across the State.

But then working with big companies like Sodexo and Kraft who might have a product that was going to expire where we could actually collect truckloads of it and get it to a food bank before it gets thrown away.

So it's been an interesting shift, but all while making sure we're able to continue to rescue food from people moving in and out of homes and apartments.

So we're firing on all cylinders.

(Adam chuckles) - When Move For Hunger won the 2016, was one of the winners of the 2016, Russ Berrie Making a Difference Awards.

Again, I just wanna remind folks if you're wondering what the series is about, 25 for 25, what is it?

It's way more than our branding slogan.

Over the past 25 years, in fact, since 1997, the Berrie Foundation recognized 303, it has recognized 366 New Jerseyans who are making a huge difference.

Over $3.5 million in cash awards from the Berrie Foundation and Move For Hunger was one of them.

When you won that award and you met all those other folks who were making a difference largely in non-profits, but individuals, just heroes, heroines.

Do you remember that day?

- It's hard to forget because when you're in a room filled with that many inspiring people, you just...

Your brain just starts racing and you're... All you... Like for me, it was like, well, what else can I do?

Like these... - Right.

- These people are doing these incredible things, why aren't I doing more?

And while to some, you know, it feels like the work that Move For Hunger is doing is also inspiring.

But I know that - Yep.

- there's still so much more that we need to do.

And one note, I will say about the Russell Berrie Foundation which makes them stand out.

I mean, we've really been blessed to work with a number of foundations, but Russell Berrie has been more than just giving a check to support our organization.

They've been really good about following up, finding ways to connect the dots, to connect us to other individuals, other organizations, figuring out that sense of collaboration.

Because when you're talking about issues as big as hunger, and food waste, and poverty, these aren't things that any single organization is going to be able to do on their own.

It really does require some collaboration.

And I just gotta shout out some love to the Russell Berrie Foundation, because they've really been able to help us connect some of those dots, especially during these really challenging times.

- Before I let you go, food insecurity, hunger, a social justice issue, is it not?

- Absolutely, hunger is a symptom of poverty.

And regardless of who you voted for Democrat, Republican, it doesn't really matter.

I mean, really what this comes down to is it's going to take all of our elected officials to think about poverty in a different way.

We need to help rise people up out of poverty, get them to have living wages so that they can actually support themselves.

People shouldn't have to visit a food bank, we shouldn't be celebrating that we fed that many more people this year.

My goal is to eventually go out of business which I know many food banks and pantries would like to do as well.

But until then we need to continue to advocate and put positive pressure on the system to move in that way to really help people help themselves.

- Adam Lowy is Executive Director and Founder of Move For Hunger.

One of the 25 for 25.

Over 25 years of the Russ Berrie Making a Difference Awards that we recognize.

Adam, we thank you for joining us but more importantly for the work you and your colleagues do every day, all the best.

- Thank you.

I'm Steve Adubato, we'll be right back.

- [Narrator] To watch more One on One with Steve Adubato find us online and follow us on Social media.

- We're now joined by Melissa Gertz, Co-Founder, Executive Director of the Community Justice Center.

Good to see you Melissa.

It's last time- - Thank you.

- We saw each other was in person at the Berrie Awards.

- It was (chuckles) - Yeah, let's put this in perspective.

You're a 2018 winner of the Russ Berrie Award For Making A Difference.

First of all, tell folks what that meant to you and your organization.

- Well (chuckles) it was incredibly humbling.

It brought me back to kind of a guiding star for me which is the former New Jersey State Supreme Court, Justice Virginia Long.

One of her quotes that has guided me for a long time.

"You will have the chance to make a difference.

The issue is whether you will take it.

You can be an ordinary thread in the tunic or you can be that royal touch of purple that gives distinction to the garment.

Be that royal touch of purple to the world."

Winning that award confirmed that I was doing something right, and I was last year thanks to the publicity of the foundation, I was lucky enough to be inducted into the Supreme Court of the United States in front of all nine justices.

- Amazing.

You know, I was remiss.

I don't wanna assume that if people saw our previous interviews they know what the Community Justice Center is.

A, what is it, and who do you serve?

- So, the Community Justice Center is a legal services nonprofit based in Trenton, serving Central New Jersey's veterans and others who struggle with invisible disabilities.

Basically we assist them in trying to get the treatment and benefits that they rightfully deserve, either before the department of veterans affairs or the social security administration.

We are the only New Jersey legal services nonprofit accredited to appear in veterans court.

- We've been asking all the winners.

so the Russ Berrie Award for Making A Difference Award is this, COVID has impacted our lives in so many ways.

How has COVID-19 impacted, not just the work of your organization, but the people you serve.

- Yeah.

In terms of the work the courts were closed for a very long time.

So everything was kind of put on hold even though the health and the needs of our clients, that was not put on hold.

In terms of our client population, almost all of our clients fall within COVID's vulnerable population category because of their, the health conditions that they're dealing with.

We kind of switched gears a little bit and help them with, you know getting their stimulus checks and getting other sources of funding that might have become available because of COVID.

The courts are now solely opening and we're moving forward now but it's been a long along year in that sense.

- You know, it's interesting Melissa we talk all the time about our veterans, and our they're our heroes and what they've done for us to allow us to continue to live the life that we live in our country.

But as I remember interviewing you, and I've been honored over the last many years since the Russ Berrie Awards started to host that event.

So I've met so many fascinating people.

I remember when I interviewed you you talked about this.

I want to talk about it again.

Veterans often have a very difficult time obtaining disability designation from the VA, because?

- In part it's a very, very, very complicated process.

And those that are trying to seek the benefits are also medically sometimes very ill and trying to fight for their benefits while also in a sense, trying to get better.

One of the other differences is in within the social security administration to get disability there are about a 170 different medical codes so to speak.

In the VA, there are thousands and thousands and the VA it's also, if you think of that old children's game, Chutes and Ladders the claim can kind of go up and down and up and down and up and down and in between each decision can take years.

So it's just, it's a very long process and it's just very cumbersome and complicated and it shouldn't be, but it is.

- You know, essentially you talked about the social security administration but also the VA, the veterans administration.

Cumbersome we get it, bureaucratic but I don't understand why are there two different places that veterans, disabled veterans would go?

Why isn't it one centralized federal agency?

- Well, they've took very different purposes.

The social security administration has to do with whether you can work medically or not.

And you're either entitled to it or you're not.

It's all or nothing.

On the VA side, they don't care about whether you can work, they care about whether you're injured and whether it's connected to service and that's, and you get it.

You don't get all or nothing.

You can get partial disability.

You can get...it's on a scale.

But because they have two different purposes they have two different definitions of disability and they also don't talk to each other very well.

- Shocking.

So you say about federal agencies.

I wanna do this, Melissa tell folks and tell me about why you care so much about these veterans?

- So, it's very personal to me.

Well, in the summer of 2004, while in the midst of attending Rutgers Newark Law School I was doing civil rights work in the Mississippi Delta and life pretty much decided to really interrupt.

In short, I was in a near fatal car accident.

I survived, but not without a face full of hardware extremely limited vision, PTSD and most significantly traumatic brain injury.

So, I have an insight because of my personal experience and I have the legal background to serve these veterans.

And I would say they're more willing to open up to me because I share their experience.

- It's highly personal for you.

I remember you told me that we were up at Ramapo when you received the award, the Berrie Award, highly personal for you.

- I also another way that I kind of, I would say inspired my clients after my car accident I was told I needed to find another career and becoming a lawyer was no longer going to be feasible.

And that wasn't going to do.

I had wanted to be a lawyer since my childhood days of watching Matlock.

And I said, no, I'm going back to school.

And I persevered while others were competing for post-graduate clerkships and associate positions.

I was learning how to see again.

But I finished and I took Pennsylvania and New Jersey bar exams and I passed on the first try.

- This is Melissa Gertz, Co-Founder and Executive Director of the Community Justice Center, the 2018 winner of the Russ Berrie Making A Difference Award.

Melissa, thank you, not just for joining us as part of this 25 to 25 initiative, recognizing 25 winners over 25 years of the Berrie Award, but more importantly thank you for the work you do every day.

Thank you, Melissa.

All the best.

- Thank you.

You too.

I'm Steve Adubato.

Thank you so much for watching.

We'll see you next time.

- [Narrator] One-On-One with Steve Adubato has been a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Funding has been provided by The Russell Berrie Foundation.

Holy Name Medical Center.

The Turrell Fund, supporting Reimagine Childcare.

TD Bank.

United Airlines.

Seton Hall University.

The Fidelco Group.

ADP.

And by Fedway Associates, Inc.

Promotional support provided by NJ on Air.

And by ROI-NJ.

Data shows that many patients have avoided seeking critical health care in the wake of COVID-19 but delaying medical care can have serious consequences.

Holy Name Medical Center was the first hospital in North Jersey to conduct a deep rigorous cleaning of our facilities, using manual disinfection, electrostatic sanitizing mist and UVC lighting.

At Holy Name we're clean, we're open and we're safe for all your healthcare needs.