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Bob Murray, Provost of St. Thomas Aquinas College Delivers Moving Speech At Celebration To Honor Those Who Give Time & Money To Help Those In Need
By Tina Traster
Last Wednesday morning, or should we say: “the morning after,” Patrick Byrne, Rockland Community Foundation’s advisory board chair and Philanthropy Day Committee Chair, put this question to a room of 350 people: “How can there be any higher aim in life than giving?
If ever there was a rhetorical question, this was it. Byrne was addressing Rockland’s fiercest advocates for those in need. This was the 24th Annual Philanthropy Day breakfast held at the Crowne Plaza in Suffern where six honorees were recognized — but then this is a crowd in which nearly everyone deserves to be appreciated for tireless, nonprofit work in Rockland County. These are the folks on the frontlines; these are people who work everyday to make the lives of others better.
“These people are happiest when they’re doing good for other people, particularly at a time when so many need it,” Byrne continued.
This year’s Philanthropy Day honorees are Rena Finkelstein (Outstanding Philanthropist), Devyn Pupo (Outstanding Youth in Philanthropy), Esther Schulman (Outstanding Nonprofit and Fundraising Professional). Howard Goldin and Edward Frank shared Outstanding Volunteer awards, while Veolia was given the Outstanding Corporate Leadership Award.
Keynote speaker Bob Murray, Provost of St. Thomas Aquinas College, tied his talk to two commemorations: Kristallnacht, (Nov. 10) and Veteran’s Day (Nov. 11), referencing Jews who fought to protect themselves and American troops who have died to protect freedom. He talked about the need for service, justice, and truth at a time when our nation is divided and on a knife’s edge emotionally and psychologically.
“The word of the day is ‘community’,” he said, segueing back to the need in Rockland County.
Citing the ALICE report (Asset Limited), he said, “48 percent of people in Rockland County are living at the poverty level based on the ALICE scale.” ALICE is a United Way acronym which stands for Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed, which represents the increasing number of individuals and families who work, but are unable to meet their basic needs, including food, childcare, housing, health care and transportation.
Murray’s keynote gravitated to the philosophical underpinning of what it means to be philanthropic. He pointed to Rosa Parks, who was homeschooled, taking care of a sick mother when she refused to give up a seat. Quoting her, he said, “All I was trying to do was to get home from work.”
“This was not earth-shattering speech or a profound defense,” he said. “She just said the word ‘no’.”
Murray was drawing a parallel to giving because at times it may seem difficult to know where to start.
“Small, sober, undramatic,” choices can be forms of philanthropy – even if it is not what one does for a career. Giving, he added, “is not measured by money; it’s measured by the depth of the impact.”
Murray humanized the act of giving by telling fragments of his own story. He grew up in a lower middle-class blue-collar house with “powdered milk” and where “name brands were rare.” He admitted times weren’t always easy and that his refuge as a child was his grandmother, who kept dollar bills in a ceramic sugar bowl in the China closet. When needed, he knew where to go for comfort. And later in life, when he and his wife were getting started, the young couple relied on the generosity of his wife’s family.
After Murray’s keynote, each honoree was introduced, and then awarded for service.
Humbled and stunned, Ren Finkelstein, a proponent of education and mental health, told the crowd she was not a million-dollar donor but shared that she practiced sustained persistence and committed patience for her causes, which included her role in the Rockland Mental Health Association, now New York Mental Health Association.
“Most of it was a passion,” she said, explaining her activism started around a kitchen table because she was parenting a child with mental illness at a time when the issue was a source of stigma and shame, and resources were limited. Finkelstein has also co-presided over NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness Rockland) until 2016, then became its full-time Board President and Executive Director.
Devyn Pupo, a senior at the Academy of the Holy Angels, was a child when she lost her father to 9/11 related illness. In 2022, in response to the murders of two NYPD detectives Jason Rivera and Wilbert Mora, she founded Hearts for Heroes. The activist organized more than 500 children in the religious education program at St. John Henry Newman parish in Tappan to create wooden heart keepsakes for the officers who worked with the fallen detectives.
Wearing her school uniform, Pupo accepted the award for Outstanding Youth in Philanthropy.
“My father died when I was in kindergarten,” she said to the hushed crowd. She thanked her mother, who was in the audience, for all the support she’s given.
In the humblest fashion, Esther Schulman, a longstanding figure in the nonprofit sector in Rockland County, began by saying, “I’m not accustomed to being in the limelight.”
Schulman was awarded “Outstanding Nonprofit and Fundraising Professional.”
And to Murray’s earlier points, that’s exactly who Schulman is: someone who has worked fastidiously and with unswerving dedication to help others, including in her most recent appointment as Outreach Director at Rockland’s Holocaust Museum and Center for Tolerance and Education. The honoree previously served as Director of Community & Donor Relations at Rockland Jewish Federation. During that time, she helped secure $1 million in donations for direct aid victims to the Oct. 7th attack on Israel. Prior to that, she spent 17 years as Manager of Philanthropy & Public Affairs at The Arc Rockland, which provides lifelong services for people with developmental and intellectual abilities.
Howard Goldin and Edward Frank shared the Outstanding Volunteer award. Both honorees have been recognized through the years for their contributions to the Veteran’s community. The pair co-founded S.T.E.P (Schools to End Poverty) in 2006, a 501c3 Foundation that seeks to end poverty through education. Since its founding, the organization has given more than $900,000 in funding and in-kind donations, including helping to build schools in Vietnam.
Notably, Goldin talked about his son Jason who died from second-hand exposure to Agent Orange. Goldin, a Vietnam veteran, sits on the Advisory Board for “Vietnam Memories, Stories Left at the Wall,” an interactive traveling museum.
Service to others is not about “me,” he said. “It’s about we.”
Veoila, which provides water service to more than 500,000 in Rockland County, Orange, Westchester, Putnam, and Tioga counties, won the final award for Outstanding Corporate Leadership.
“As the regulated provider of drinking water to most of Rockland, we take very seriously our role in sustaining the exceptional quality of life that Rockland enjoys today,” said Bill Madden, who also served as Master of Ceremonies for the 24th Annual Philanthropy Day breakfast celebration. “But we also understand the importance of corporate citizenship and the need to support the communities where we do business.”
Over the last three years, Veolia has donated more than $900,000 in cash donations locally. In 2024, the organization will contribute $325,000 to 47 different organizations, he added.
