Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC)
Jewish Federation Hires New Associate Director of the Jewish Community Relations Council
The Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC), a program of the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati, has named Debra Pinger as Associate Director. Pinger will support the Council in all aspects of its work as the public affairs arm of the Cincinnati Jewish community.
“We are thrilled to have such an experienced and dedicated Associate Director on board at the Jewish Community Relations Council,” said Sara Weiss, Director. “Our mission is to protect the safety of the Jewish community through justice for all, which is obviously an enormous mission with challenges and great importance. Debra Pinger brings to us the right balance of knowledge, warmth, and enthusiasm for the work.”
A communications professional throughout her career, Pinger’s most recent post was Managing Director of the Nashville Film Festival, one of the nation’s largest and oldest film festivals. In that role, she managed all media and government relations, and marketing. Previously, in Cincinnati, she was executive director of the VIA Institute on Character, a nonprofit organization from the Mayerson Foundation in the science of positive psychology. She led the development and delivery of VIA’s initial training of psychologists and executive coaches in countries around the world. In her role as executive director of RISE Learning Solutions, a Mayerson Foundation initiative, she spearheaded the development of the model and delivery of live, television-based distance learning to educators from associations such as Head Start, the National Association for the Education of Young Children, the California Department of Education, the Ohio Department of Education, and the University of Cincinnati’s Early Childhood Learning Community.
Pinger was senior counselor at Dan Pinger Public Relations and a reporter and anchor at WDIV-TV in Detroit and WCPO-TV in Cincinnati. She was educated at Sarah Lawrence College and Union Institute and University.
“I couldn’t be happier to join Sarah Weiss and the JCRC board in representing the Jewish community in our relations with the greater Cincinnati community,” said Pinger. “Cincinnati’s Jewish Community Relations Council has a rich history that began in the 1930s. I look forward to continuing our tradition of thoughtful engagement with emerging issues as we help shape Cincinnati’s future as an even more welcoming and just community.”