CCAR Staff

Rabbi Steven A. Fox is the Chief Executive of the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR), the rabbinic leadership organization of Reform Judaism in North America and worldwide. Since joining the CCAR in 2006, Rabbi Fox has led the transformation of the CCAR into a 21^st century organization, working to sustain and enrich the Jewish community to ensure a vibrant Jewish future.

Under Rabbi Fox’s leadership, the CCAR has renewed its focus on strengthening the Jewish community by investing in the rabbis who lead it. Since Rabbi Fox took the CCAR helm, the organization has dramatically increased its support services for rabbis, including educational and spiritual offerings to meet the personal and professional needs of the rabbinate and their communities. In addition, under Rabbi Fox, the historic CCAR Press has become the leading publisher of an expanded library of liturgy and resources for the Reform Movement, including cutting-edge e-publications.

Rabbi Fox brings a varied and rich background to his CCAR leadership. He was ordained at HUC-JIR in 1980 and his early rabbinic career included service at Temple Emanuel in Worcester, Massachusetts and Temple Isaiah in Lexington, Massachusetts. He later served as an adjunct rabbi of Temple Isaiah in Los Angeles where he focused his work on spiritual growth through Jewish meditation, contemplative practices, and study of sacred text.

Supplementing his rabbinic training, Rabbi Fox received his Juris Doctor degree to gain additional tangible business and legal skills. As a practicing attorney and managing partner in a Los Angeles based law firm, Rabbi Fox advised religious and secular non-profits, rabbis and cantors, congregations and other Jewish organizations on a variety of issues, such as contract matters, employment disputes, board relations, charitable gifts and grants, rabbinic wellness and other organizational concerns. He is also a trained mediator, helping to resolve many diverse and challenging disputes between rabbis, cantors, educators, and congregations.

Rabbi Fox has also been actively involved in raising the profile of the CCAR to its membership and the Jewish community. He has represented the CCAR at the White House on several occasions, and most recently attended both the 2013 Inauguration of President Barack Obama and the National Prayer Service. Rabbi Fox is a sought out thought-leader in the Jewish community and in the Jewish press. He is a regular contributor to RavBlog, the blog of the Central Conference of American Rabbis.

A native of Los Angeles, Rabbi Fox has been married to Vicki Reikes Fox for 34 years, and they have two grown children. Vicki is a museum consultant and artist and is founding project director of the Museum of Southern Jewish History in Mississippi and the museum curator who created the current Zimmer Children’s Museum in Los Angeles. She is also the author of Shalom Y’all, Images of Jewish Life in the American South, and the illustrator of Seasons for Celebration.

Articles by Rabbi Steven A. Fox:

• eJewish Philanthropy: The Importance of Parsonage
• eJewish Philanthropy: Making the First 100 Days Count: Rabbinic Transition
• Huffington Post: The Equality Act Would Provide Comprehensive LGBT Civil Rights. It's About Time.
• The Times of Israel: Politics from the pulpit on the menu for this Jewish New Year

Rabbi Hara Person is the Chief Strategy Officer of Central Conference of American Rabbis. In that capacity, she oversees the Communications Department, serves as Publisher of CCAR Press, and works with leadership on overall organizational strategy. She also oversees the publication of the CCAR Journal: A Reform Jewish Quarterly.

Rabbi Person was ordained in 1998 from HUC-JIR, after graduating summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Amherst College (1986) and receiving an MA in Fine Arts from New York University’s International Center of Photography (1992). Before coming to the CCAR, Rabbi Person was the Editor-in-Chief of URJ Books and Music, where she was responsible for the revision of The Torah: A Modern Commentary (2005) and the publication of many significant projects, including the Aleph Isn’t Tough adult Hebrew series and Mitkadem: Hebrew for Youth as well as several award-winning children’s books. While at URJ, she was also the Managing Editor of The Torah: A Women’s Commentary, named the National Jewish Book Award Book of the Year in 2008.

Rabbi Person is also the author of Stories of Heaven and Earth: Bible Heroes in Contemporary Children’s Literature and That You May Live Long: Caring for Your Aging Parents, as well as Co-Editor of Caring for Yourself, and Editor of The Mitzvah of Healing.  Her essays and poems have been published in various anthologies and journals, including Bridges: A Jewish Feminist Journal, upstreet, Encyclopedia of Jewish American Popular Culture, Women and Judaism, The Continuum Encyclopedia of Children’s Literature, and The Women’s Haftarah Commentary.

Since 1998, Rabbi Person has been the High Holy Day Rabbi of Congregation B’nai Olam, Fire Island Pines, NY, and she has been named Adjunct Rabbi at the Brooklyn Heights Synagogue, where she teaches occasionally.

Rabbi Person lives in Brooklyn, NY, and is the mother of two young adults.

Articles by Rabbi Hara Person:

• Ms. Magazine: It’s Time to Give Working Moms the Gift of Economic Equality
• Religion Dispatches: The Moral Outrage of Comparing Abortion to the Holocaust
• Ms Magazine: The Injustice of Unequal Pay
• The Forward: The Reform Movement Is Struggling With Gender Equity, Says First Female Leader Of CCAR
• The Times of Israel: Sukkot: A Season of Empathy
• JTA: How to Understand the Kavanaugh Allegations, According to Rabbis
• The Forward: What Jews Should Watch For In The Kavanaugh Confirmation Hearings
• The Times of Israel: Beware of ‘Biblical’ Policies
• My Jewish Learning: Hashkiveinu: Seeking Comfort and Protection Through the Night
• The Times of Israel: Israel Has to Stop Naming Things After Trump
• PopSugar: The Problem With Mother's Day
• The Times of Israel: The Political Is Personal
• Jewish Telegraphic Agency: When Women Rabbis Say ‘#MeToo,’ Communities Must Pay Attention
• The Forward: Why Women’s Torah Commentary Matters Today More Than Ever Before
• Motto: Rabbi: President Trump’s Birth Control Mandate Is an Attack on Religious Liberty
• CNBC: Gay Marriage Violates Religious Rules? Not True.
• Huffington Post: The Equality Act Would Provide Comprehensive LGBT Civil Rights. It's About Time
• The Forward: The Choose-Your-Own-Adventure High Holidays Prayer Book
• eJewish Philanthropy: How Far We’ve Come – and How Much Farther We Still Need to Go: Four Decades of Women in the Rabbinate

Laurie Pinho is the Chief Financial Officer and the Chief Operating Officer of the CCAR. In her current position, Ms. Pinho is responsible for overseeing the finance department of the CCAR, as well as the daily operations including the human resources functions of the CCAR office. She joined the CCAR in 2007, bringing with her a strong background in finance and management. At the CCAR, she previously held positions as Assistant Comptroller, and then as Comptroller.

Ms. Pinho is a New York State Certified Public Accountant. She has earned her MBA in Accounting from Bernard M. Baruch College in New York City, and she did her undergraduate work at Stockton College in Pomona, New Jersey.

She lives in New Jersey with her husband and two daughters.

Rabbi Cindy Enger is delighted to join the staff of the CCAR as Director of Rabbinic Placement as of July 1, 2017. She brings a wealth of experiences to this position and, with her unique background, she understands the views of both rabbis and lay leaders in congregational life and in Jewish organizations.  Rabbi Enger is a leader who combines an understanding of vison and mission with organizational and spiritual leadership.

Rabbi Enger has served as a congregational rabbi in Bellingham, Washington, and in Chicago, as well as an organizational rabbi at the FaithTrust Institute in Seattle. At the FaithTrust Institute, she developed and directed the Jewish Program, working with both rabbis and congregations. Prior to entering the rabbinate, Rabbi Enger worked as an attorney in Chicago, first in a large law firm and later as an Associate Public Guardian on behalf of abused and neglected children and disabled adults. During that time, she served as a Temple President when her congregation entered into search for its first rabbi.

In addition to her rabbinic ordination from Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion, Rabbi Enger holds a Juris Doctor from New York University School of Law and a Bachelor of Arts from Princeton University. Her lifelong commitment to learning has included writing workshops, Jewish Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Training, Prepare and Enrich Facilitator Training, and Clinical Pastoral Education.

Rabbi Enger has taught in a variety of settings and is the author of a number of publications in both the Jewish and secular world. Examples of this include being a presenter in the CCAR Interim Rabbi Training program on being an “after-rabbi” (following a rabbi who left due to ethical misconduct). She is the author of an Eilu V’Eilu column on “What is the role of the rabbi in our congregations today?” (URJ, Volume 39, 2009). She co-edited the publication Domestic Abuse and the Jewish Community: Perspectives from the First International Conference, as well as A Journey Towards Freedom: A Haggadah for Women Who Have Experienced Domestic Violence (FaithTrust Institute, 2003). She served on a panel, “Contemplative Prayer and Embodied Healing,” at the Third Annual Conference on Medicine and Religion, Chicago, 2014, and delivered the Memorial Address at Princeton University’s Annual Service of Remembrance, 2012.

Rabbi Enger also has important leadership experience in the Reform Movement. This work has included, among other things, representation on the CCAR/URJ’s National Commission on Rabbinic Congregational Relationships, the CCAR/HUC-JIR Joint Commission on Mentoring, and most recently on the CCAR Ethics Process Review Task Force on Notification Issues.

Rabbi Enger is a native of St. Louis, Missouri.  She enjoys bike riding, kayaking and gardening, and delights in hiking with her dog, Max, a Great Pyrenees mix.

Rabbi Betsy Torop was ordained at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati, OH in 1990. Following her ordination, Rabbi Torop served as a rabbi in Melbourne, Australia for 8 years, first as an assistant rabbi at Temple Beth Israel and then with her husband, Rabbi Michael Torop, at the Leo Baeck Centre. Upon returning to the United States, Rabbi Torop served as the Director of Jewish Life and Learning at the Sid Jacobson Jewish Community Center in Roslyn, NY and as Rabbi at Congregation Shir Shalom in Bradenton, FL before becoming the Rabbi at Congregation Beth Shalom in 2003. Rabbi Torop has contributed a study guide on Pirke Avot to the UAHC Significant Jewish Books Initiative and a commentary on Exodus, Chapter 1 to Beginning the Journey: Toward a Women’s Commentary on Torah. She is a past chair of the CCAR Convention and has previously served as a CCAR board member and dues chair. She is the mother of three children.