With one side arguing for their fundamental right to pray and the other insisting on secular living spaces, a court case involving a small group of Orthodox residents who are suing to hold services in their condominium complex is set to wrap up today.
When a largely Jewish condo association refused to allow about 40 Orthodox families to hold services once a week, two residents sued the 442-unit Grandview at Emerald Hills in March of last year. Local Jewish leaders have pointed to this and other situations as indications of a larger intra-Jewish problem.
“I fear this is an expression of intolerance,” said Usher Bryn, an Aventura-based attorney representing the Orthodox residents. “The [other residents] dress it up under the guise of all kinds of things, but it is intolerance.”
Herman Neuman and Seymour Okner and the other aging Orthodox residents say they can no longer fulfill their religious requirement to walk to a synagogue. They say they are being singled out because of their strict religious observance, and insist their right to “peaceable assemble” has been violated. Closing arguments will be made before Broward Circuit Court Judge Leroy Moe in Fort Lauderdale.
Non-Orthodox condo members, however, have said all along that it has nothing to do with religion.
If one group is allowed to turn the condo into a synagogue, “any religious group of any denomination can expect to use our facilities,” said a board memo. Others are upset because they say the Orthodox residents lied when they reserved the room for a “party,” then locked the door to pray. Board members advised them to hold services in their apartments.
“I am Jew as well, sir, and I take offense that your clients are making this a religious issue rather than a rules issue and a discussion by the board as to the use of a common [room],” said opponent and board member Henry Zibman to Bryn in a deposition. “It has nothing to do with anyone’s religion.”
Attorney Geoffrey Marks, who is representing Grandview, could not be reached for comment.
The Grandview situation is only one of several incidents around Emerald Hills and Hollywood Hills in the past year that has prompted some to question if there is an intra-Jewish problem within the community.
A bitter commission meeting ensued in September after a rabbi from the ultra-Orthodox Chabad Lubavitch congregation bought two homes in Hollywood Hills but never revealed his intentions to turn one of them into a synagogue, saying he was confused by the paperwork.
More recently another group of aging Orthodox residents asked commissioners to spend $70,000 to move a traffic signal 90 feet down the street to make the walk to Young Israel Orthodox synagogue services shorter.
In each case some of the most vocal opponents were other non-Orthodox residents. Samuel G. Freedman, the New York-based author of Jew vs. Jew: The Struggle for the Soul of American Jewry surmised that “the real issue is who sets the tone of life in a Jewish community.”
The problems at Grandview started in December 2000, when Orthodox residents who had trouble walking to services, reserved the common room for two successive Saturdays. They held services followed by a small party or kiddush — in one case to celebrate a boy’s recovery from brain surgery.
After some complained, condo residents met in June 2001 to discuss the issue. The dispute became heated with residents tossing around phrases like “I was in the Holocaust and I made it” and “You have people who are Hitlers.”
Toward the end of the meeting “one little woman who weighs 98 pounds soaking wet” objected and was spit on by an Orthodox resident, said board President Irving Haymes.
In the end condo dwellers voted 312 to 92 against holding “religious activities of any kind” in the common room, banning anything from praying to Christmas and Chanukah parties.
Among those affected by the vote were Nathan and Shirley Rothner, two Young Israel members who are over 85 years old. The couple has lived at Grandview more than 14 years and during this time Shirley Rothner has become nearly blind. “As we grew older it began getting harder to walk and eventually took us 45 minutes to one hour to cover the same distance,” said the couple in a letter pleading with their neighbors.
Soon after Neuman and Okner sued Grandview. In January, Judge Moe granted a partial motion for a temporary injunction preventing the board from banning any kind of “religious activity.” Whether or not “religious meetings” will be banned is yet to be decided.
As the case has wound through the court system over the past year, board members have continued to insist the majority of residents voted to live in the secular community they bought into.
Noaki Schwartz can be reached at or 954-385-7930
