Tawonga from 2010 to 2025

Ken Kramarz Returns

In 2011, Ken Kramarz returned to Tawonga as executive director, working alongside Camp Director Jamie Simon and an experienced year-round team that included Becca Meyer, Gregg Rubenstein, Ryley Katz, Ashley Costello, and Aaron Mandel.

The Rim Fire and Restoration

Two summers later, the Rim Fire — the largest forest fire in California’s history at that time — burned through the Stanislaus National Forest and reached Tawonga’s property. No campers were at camp, and staff evacuated, taking the Vodňany Torah with them. The fire destroyed three buildings — two staff cabins and the director’s house — and damaged Makom Shalom and the Challenge Course.

Central camp remained green, but nearby sections of the surrounding forest were burned. Tawonga repaired the damaged areas and began the long work of restoring the land — an effort that would help shape planning for the site in the years ahead.

Year-Round and Lifelong

The strategic plan accelerated Tawonga’s efforts to bring camp’s approach to Jewish life into the Bay Area. These “down the mountain” programs combined music, experiential learning, outdoor ritual, and community building in settings closer to home.

One of the earliest and most visible examples was Tawonga’s Erev Rosh Hashanah celebration, which grew from an independent outdoor gathering known as the Tilden Minyan.

High Holy Days Under the Trees

That gathering began with a child’s question. In 2009, Deborah Newbrun and Sue Reinhold were worshipping indoors with their family on Rosh Hashanah when Reinhold’s eight-year-old daughter asked why they were indoors instead of outside in nature.

The question led Newbrun and Reinhold to imagine an outdoor service. Together with their friend and longtime Tawonga songleader Isaac Zones, they founded the Tilden Minyan, inviting a small group of friends to Tilden Park in Berkeley. About 15 people gathered for the first service.

The gathering grew quickly. After Keshet Family Camp participants were invited in 2010, attendance reached 50. Within a few years, approximately 250 people were taking part. Tawonga became an institutional partner in 2012, providing support that allowed the gathering to grow further.

Eventually, the service outgrew its location within Tilden Park, where limited parking and restrictions on amplified sound made further growth difficult. The gathering moved to a variety of new locations. More than 750 people attended in 2015, gathering among the redwoods with blankets for song, prayer, children’s activities, and dozens of shofars. By 2019, attendance had grown to approximately 1,300.

In 2022, Newbrun, Reinhold, and Zones added an Early Kol Nidre service. Designed as a smaller, more contemplative gathering, it brought approximately 200 people together for music, prayer, and reflection during its first year.

By 2025, Tawonga was hosting two annual outdoor High Holy Day services with a combined attendance of roughly 1,500. Newbrun and Zones continued to lead them alongside a team of musicians and singers, emphasizing accessible, family-friendly prayer, music, and reflection.

Across a Lifetime

The High Holy Day gatherings were one expression of a broader change. Tawonga was creating more ways for people to enter — and return to — Jewish community at different stages of life.

The B*Mitzvah Program grew from a conversation between Jamie Simon and a group of eighth graders who wanted the freedom to shape their own Jewish journeys. Launched in 2016, the two-year program combined camp-style classes, family learning, outdoor experiences, weekend Shabbatons, and individualized coming-of-age celebrations for cohorts in San Francisco and the East Bay.

Drawing on his earlier leadership of Tawonga’s teen programs, Aaron Mandel reestablished the Teen Leadership Institute (TLI) in 2017, creating another opportunity between being a camper and joining the staff.

Its first participants backpacked along the rim of Yosemite Valley, practiced outdoor leadership, and worked with the Tuolumne River Trust to clear trails and support reforestation near camp.

Tot Shabbats and other local gatherings offered additional points of entry for Tawonga’s youngest participants and their families.

In 2021, Tawonga piloted Family School, a monthly, havurah-style program for families with young children. Originally led by Meg Adler, It brought Jewish learning, ritual, play, and community building to families in the Bay Area.

Beyond Summer Camp

The expansion of year-round programming also changed the calendar at the Tuolumne site. Tawonga added more family camp weekends throughout the spring, summer, and fall, giving adults and children opportunities to experience camp together.

Some weekends became informal alumni gatherings, as former campers and staff returned with partners, children, and longtime Tawonga friends.

Adult retreats created other paths back to camp. Women’s Weekend and, later, Men’s Weekend combined familiar elements of Tawonga — Shabbat, singing, hiking, the river, and evenings together — with programs and conversations designed for adults.

Teen retreats helped participants remain connected between summers and at different stages in their lives.

As the calendar expanded, Tawonga’s season extended well beyond traditional summer camp. The Tuolumne site increasingly became a place people could return to across generations — as campers, staff members, parents, retreat participants, and alumni.

Supporting all of this required a substantially larger year-round staff. Tawonga was no longer preparing only for summer; it was running programs and building community throughout the year.

Building for Growth

The vision of a year-round Tawonga required significant changes to the physical site. Beginning in 2014, Executive Director Ken Kramarz and Board President Steve Catechi led a team of staff and board members working with Leddy Maytum Stacy Architects to develop a comprehensive Master Facilities Plan.

Completed in 2015, the plan identified aging infrastructure, environmental priorities, and the buildings needed to serve more people across more seasons.

The plan began with essential infrastructure: a new Health Center to replace the aging infirmary, a new Central Bathhouse, winterized housing for supervisors and family camps, and underground PG&E utilities to improve fire safety.

The plan also called for a new Teen Village to replace the one lost in the 1999 Pilot Fire, a Garden Kitchen that introduced an entirely new program area long-championed by Becca Meyer, and a solar array to reduce camp’s carbon footprint. Across camp, aging cabins were replaced with improved buildings that preserved their rustic character while providing better housing for campers and weekend participants.

Together, these projects would support year-round use, add beds, and substantially increase Tawonga’s capacity.

Turning the plan into reality required an organization-wide capital campaign — something Tawonga had never attempted on this scale. The board approved an initial goal of $15 million and launched the Campaign to Preserve and Protect Tawonga.

The Leslie family — Debra and Mark, Sara and Josh, and Sharon and Seth — made the capital campaign’s $5 million lead gift.

Earlier support from Deborah and Peter Wexler helped lay the groundwork for the effort. Altogether, the campaign raised more than $17 million.

The growth also brought continuing responsibilities: more facilities and programs required a larger staff, greater enrollment, and a larger operating budget. By the centennial, Tawonga needed to raise roughly $2 million annually beyond program revenue.

Lisa Wertheim and Jamie Simon played central roles in the campaign’s success. Hired in 2012 as Tawonga’s first development director, Wertheim worked closely with Simon, board leaders, campaign volunteers, and donors to build a stronger culture of giving and sustain the fundraising effort. Wertheim retired from Tawonga in 2025 after 14 years at the organization.

Caring for Camp

Camp’s caretakers provided another kind of continuity. Living at Tawonga throughout the year, they maintained its buildings and systems, watched over the property through winter storms and fire seasons, and cared for the land between one summer and the next.

Over the years, many people contributed to this work as members of Tawonga’s Buildings and Grounds teams. The photographs that follow show four of the leaders who guided those teams.

Rethinking Belonging

Tawonga’s approach to inclusion continued to change as campers and staff asked how familiar structures could make room for a wider range of identities. In 2017, Tawonga added a Beyond the Binary option to its longstanding gender campfires, creating another space for campers to talk about identity, expectations, and belonging.

The language of the physical site changed as well. Boys’ Side became River Side, and Girls’ Side became Ridge Side.

The idea for a dedicated all-gender cabin grew from campers themselves. In earlier summers, some cabin groups had adopted more inclusive names to reflect the identities of their members; one renamed itself All-Gender 1.

Building on those choices, Camp Director Becca Meyer led the introduction of an optional all-gender cabin in 2019. The initiative also reflected Jamie Simon’s long history of advocating for greater inclusion within the Jewish community and the work Simon and Meyer had undertaken together at Tawonga.

Offered alongside boys’ and girls’ cabins, the all-gender cabin option welcomed transgender, nonbinary, and cisgender campers. Its campers joined in the same ordinary rhythms of Tawonga life — cabin activities, ropes courses, swimming, Shabbat, and nights around the campfire.

The work also extended beyond gender. In 2017 and 2018, the alumni-led group Tawongans Organizing for Racial Justice helped organize Social Justice Seders and led racial bias training for summer staff. In 2019, Tawonga launched its Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion initiative, examining how questions of identity and access shaped programming, communications, hiring, training, and board recruitment.

In 2021, Tawonga added a Jewish Families of Color weekend to its expanding lineup in order to center and celebrate Tawonga’s multiracial Jewish community.

Two years later, the organization appointed Kiyomi Gelber as its full-time director of equity, inclusion, and justice — a position the Foundation for Jewish Camp identified as the first of its kind at a Jewish summer camp. Gelber had begun working at Tawonga as a counselor in 2004 and joined the year-round staff in 2018.

Leadership Into the Centennial

As Tawonga approached its centennial, another leadership transition grew from a longstanding partnership. In February 2023, Becca Meyer became CEO when Jamie Simon left Tawonga to become chief program officer at the Foundation for Jewish Camp. Meyer had joined Tawonga’s year-round staff in 2007 and had since served as associate director, camp director, and chief program officer.

At the same time, Aaron Mandel became camp director. Mandel had first come to Tawonga as a camper in 1994, returned as a counselor, and later held several senior positions on the year-round staff. As in earlier transitions, the new titles recognized leadership that had long been developing within the Tawonga community.

Tawonga at 100

In March 2025, 700 Tawongans gathered to celebrate Camp Tawonga’s 100th anniversary. Alumni from every decade joined current families, staff, donors, and friends for an evening of stories, music, dancing, and film. Together, the community contributed $1 million to support the site, invest in staff, and help make camp accessible to future generations.

The centennial also became an occasion to gather and preserve Tawonga’s history. The film Tawonga at 100: Honoring the Past, Inspiring the Future brought together camp leaders, staff, and campers past and present to reflect on how Tawonga had changed — and what had endured — since 1925.

At the celebration, Tawonga’s first century came into view through generations of people who had made camp part of their lives.

About This Project

Almost Heaven: A Visual History of Tawonga’s 100 Years was researched, written, designed, and produced by historian and Tawonga board member Paul Herman.

Lisa Wertheim, Tawonga’s former chief development officer, championed the project from its beginning and conducted hours of oral-history interviews that were essential to telling Tawonga’s history from the 1960s onward. Casey Cohen, Tawonga’s senior director of communications, served as the project’s staff lead, managing its development and providing editorial guidance throughout. Natalie Jenkins, communications specialist, provided editorial and promotional support. Barrie Zipkin, longtime Tawongan, served as copy editor.

Many Tawongans contributed photographs, documents, memories, and corrections. Their generosity made this history possible. Any errors that remain are the author’s.