MANDEL CENTER FOR NONPROFIT ORGANIZATIONS

Stephen H. Hoffman, President, Jewish Community Federation of Cleveland
2009 Recipient of the Leadership in Nonprofit Management Award

Stephen H. Hoffman is a graduate of Dickinson College and received his Master’s degree in Social Work from the University of Maryland and a Master’s in Jewish Studies from the Baltimore Hebrew University. He is also a graduate of the Council of Jewish Federations’ Executive Recruitment and Education Program.

He began his career at the Jewish Community Federation of Cleveland in 1974, serving as director of social planning and research and assistant director before becoming the CEO in 1983. Stephen serves on the President’s Visiting Committee of Case Western Reserve University. He is a board member of the Musical Arts Association (the Cleveland Orchestra), the Mandel Foundation, the David and Inez Myers Foundation, and the Maltz Foundation.  He also has served in a number of leadership positions for United Way Services, and is a past board member of the Greater Cleveland Roundtable, an organization devoted to promoting racial harmony in the city of Cleveland.

Stephen’s impact has been national and international in scope. He is the founding director of the Council for Initiatives in Jewish Education. For three years, 2001-2004, he was “loaned” by Cleveland to serve as the president and chief executive officer of the United Jewish Communities, the national umbrella organization of the federation movement.  In 2004, he was appointed by President George W. Bush to serve on the United States delegation to the Conference on Anti-Semitism, held in Berlin, Germany, by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). He is founder and co-chair of the Secure Communities Network, a national organization concerned with communal security issues and preparedness. He also serves as interim president of the Jewish People Policy Planning Institute (Jerusalem), an international policy think tank based in Jerusalem.

Stephen was the 1999 recipient of the Charles Eisenman Award, the Federation’s highest honor. In May 2002, Stephen was awarded a Doctor of Humane Letters from the Baltimore Hebrew University, and in March 2003 he was the first recipient of the Fuchs Mizrachi School’s Guardian of Zion Award in Cleveland, Ohio. Stephen and his wife, Dr. Amy Hoffman, have two children—Emily of Cleveland (married to Eric Weingart) and Jessica of Chicago.