:: Our Lay Leaders

President: Peter L. Winik
E-mail: President@whctemple.org

     Peter L. Winik has been a member of Washington Hebrew Congregation for close to 20 years and has served as a Board Member and Officer since 2002. He has served as First Vice President, Chair of the Professional Review Committee, as well as Vice-Chair of the Long Range Strategic Planning Committee, and a member of the Budget & Finance and Technology Committees. He served as General Counsel from 2002 to 2006 and a Vice President from 2006 to 2008. His past committee service includes: Chair of the Development Committee; Co-Chair of the 2009 Rabbinic Search Committee that brought Rabbi Noah Fabricant to the Congregation; Chair of the 2005 Nominating Committee; and service on the Religious School and Governance Committees. He and his wife have also served several times as Mitzvah Day team leaders. Mr. Winik has traveled to Israel on two occasions with Washington Hebrew Congregation, once on the family trip in 1998, and again in 2005 as part of the leadership delegation trip.

     In the wider community, Mr. Winik has served on the Boards of the Jewish Council for the Aging and the Council for Court Excellence, the Board of Visitors of Stanford Law School, and as a volunteer in numerous capacities at Sidwell Friends School. He has volunteered in a variety of pro bono and bar activities during the course of his legal career. Mr. Winik also serves as a volunteer pilot for Angel Flight Mid-Atlantic, flying missions for needy patients requiring transportation to and from medical treatment.

     Mr. Winik is a partner in the international law firm of Latham & Watkins LLP, where he has practiced for 30 years. He serves as the co-chair of the firm’s global Product Liability, Mass Torts, and Consumer Class Actions practice group, and previously served as the firm’s Washington, DC office Deputy Managing Partner and Litigation Department Chair.

     Mr. Winik received his undergraduate and law degrees from Stanford University. He and his wife Sylvia, a learning specialist at the Washington International School, have two adult children: Daniel and Allison.

First Vice President: Sherry Bindeman Kahn

     Sherry Bindeman Kahn, a lifelong member of the Congregation, has been a member of the Board of Directors for the past ten years, having served on the Executive Committee for the past six years as Vice President, Secretary and Assistant Secretary. She is currently Vice-Chair of the Professional Review Committee, on which she has served for the past six years, and Chair of the Rabbinic Search Committee. She also is a member of the Budget and Finance and Minds Matter Committees.

     Last year, Ms. Kahn co-chaired the Rabbinic Search Committee that brought Rabbi Noah Fabricant to Washington Hebrew Congregation. She has chaired the Religious School Committee, served as Co-Chair of the Development Committee, and Co-Chair of the Youth Director and Religious School Director Search Committees. She has also served on the Cantorial Search and Education Advisory Committees, and served as a Mitzvah Day team leader. She is also a proud member of the Adult B’nai Mitzvah class of 2005.

     In the wider community, Ms. Kahn serves on the Scholarship and Loan Committee of the Jewish Social Service Agency and is a past member of its Board. She has been actively involved in her children’s schools, including most recently Georgetown Day School and Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School.

     A graduate of Cornell University, Ms. Kahn received a law degree from the University of Chicago. She was a partner in the law firms of Sachs, Greenebaum & Tayler and Witt, Nolan & Bindeman.

     She and her husband, David, a partner at the law firm of Holland & Knight, have three children: Brooke, Hannah and Ben.

Vice President: David M. Astrove

   David M. Astrove has been a member of the Congregation since 1989 and currently serves as Treasurer. Mr. Astrove is the Chair of the Budget and Finance Committee and is a member of the Long Range Strategic Planning Committee. He has acted as counsel to the Congregation in connection with the renovations of the Temple on Macomb Street and the Julia Bindeman Suburban Center and on several other real estate matters. Mr. Astrove is also the Treasurer and a member of the Board of the Garden of Remembrance.

     A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and the Columbia University School of Law, Mr. Astrove has previously served on the Board of the Washington, D.C. chapter of the Anti-Defamation League and currently serves on the Board of the Diener School.

     His wife, Deborah, is also his law partner at Friedlander Misler, PLLC. He has three children: Jeffrey, Brian and Michelle Astrove; and three step-children: Jeffrey, Daniel and Erica Segal.

     Cheryl Paul Baraf is the Board Liaison to the Early Childhood Centers and Primary School and Chair of the 2010 Annual Meeting. She previously served on the Executive Committee as Vice President, Treasurer, Assistant Treasurer and Assistant Secretary. A member of the Board of Directors since 1997, Ms. Baraf was Co-Chair of WHC’s150th Anniversary Celebration and Chair of Macomb Street Interiors for the Renovation Project. Ms. Baraf has been Chair of Budget and Finance, the Board Retreat, the Membership Committee, the Communications Committee, and the Fine Arts Committee for several years. She served as Chair of the 2001 Annual Meeting and as a member of several committees including Budget and Finance, Professional Review, Worship and Music, Executive Director and Cantorial Search, and Annual Contribution Review. She has also served on the Sisterhood Board.

     A graduate of the University of Michigan, Ms. Baraf received a Masters of Social Work from Catholic University. After working in family planning and rehabilitation medicine, she co-founded the clinical research division of Arthritis and Rheumatism Associates and currently serves as a consultant to their Center for Rheumatology and Bone Research. Ms. Baraf is also active in the Arthritis Foundation Metropolitan Washington Chapter.

     She and her husband Herbert, a rheumatologist, have two daughters: Alison and Meredith; a son-in-law, Aryeh Portnoy; and three grandsons: Maxwell Spencer, Brandon Fletcher and Tyler Ryan Portnoy.

Vice President: Linda Eichelbaum Collier

     Linda Eichelbaum Collier, a member of the Congregation since 1994, has served on the Board for the past ten years, the last two years of which have been on the Executive Committee as Secretary. She also serves as Vice President of the Board of Directors for Gan Zikaron Memorial Park and is a member of the Budget and Finance and Professional Review Committees. In addition, she has served as chair and cochair of numerous Temple committees, including serving as Co-Chair of Mitzvah Day 2000.

     Ms. Collier is a Real Estate Specialist with Arlington County, Virginia. Previously, she was an Assistant County Attorney for Fairfax County, Virginia and an Associate with Verner, Liipfert, Bernhard, McPherson and Hand, practicing municipal law. Ms. Collier is a graduate of the University of Virginia and the University of Richmond Law School.

     She and her husband, Guy, a partner in the law firm of McDermott, Will & Emery, have three daughters and a son-in-law: Jill, Suzanne, Leigh and Charlie.

Treasurer: Meg Jacobs Flax

     Meg Jacobs Flax, a member of the Congregation since 1992, currently is completing her sixth year on the Board, two of which have been on the Executive Committee as Assistant Secretary. Ms. Flax is Co- Chair of the Religious School Committee, a member of the Budget & Finance and Professional Review Committees and serves on the Sisterhood Board. She also has served on the Nominating Committee and various Rabbinic Search Committees and has served as a Mitzvah Day Team Leader.

     In the wider community, Ms. Flax served on the Board of the Jewish Social Service Agency (JSSA) and has served on its Executive Committee. She is also involved in various volunteer activities at Sidwell Friends School where she serves on the Development Committee and has chaired its Auction for Financial Aid.

     A graduate of Wesleyan University, Ms. Flax received a law degree from the Harvard Law School. She and her husband, Sam, have three children: Caroline, Andrew and Ellen.

Assistant Treasurer: Ivan “Van” Sabel

     Ivan (Van) Sabel has been a member of the Congregation since 1978. In the wider community, Mr. Sabel is the Chairman of the Board at Hanger Orthopedic Group, Inc., a company providing prosthetic and orthotic rehabilitation in 620 locations throughout the United States. He also serves on the Boards of Beverly Enterprises, a company engaged in elder care services throughout the U.S., the American Physicians’ Fellowship for Medicine in Israel, a foundation providing American medical personnel to the State of Israel during times of disaster, and the American Board for the University of Haifa in Israel.

     Mr. Sabel is a graduate of New York University where he earned a Bachelors of Science in Prosthetics and Orthotics.

     He and his wife, Sandi, an interior designer and a life-long member of WHC, have four children: Caroline, Amy, Jocelyn and David.

Secretary: Nell Kilburn Shapiro

     Nell Kilburn Shapiro, a member of the Congregation since 1995, has completed two terms on the Board. Ms. Shapiro has chaired the Carrie Simon House Committee for more than a decade and served as the Chair of Mitzvah Day. Currently, she is also the Chair of the Membership Task Force, a Board committee examining aspects of membership at WHC.

     In the wider community, Ms. Shapiro has been active in her children’s school, chairing its Scholarship Auction and serving on the Parents’ Association Board, as well as fundraising for her college.

     Ms. Shapiro graduated from Wellesley College and received a law degree from the Northwestern School of Law. She was an associate for the law firm of Latham & Watkins. She and her husband, Ed, have three children: Jack, Griffin and Dorothy.

Assistant Secretary: Faye Levin

     Faye Levin has been a member of Washington Hebrew Congregation for 16 years. She has been a member of the Board of Directors for the last four years, a Co-Chair of the Religious School Committee, a Co-Chair of the Edlavitch-Tyser Family Relations Forum and a member of the Long Range Strategic Planning Committee. Ms. Levin has been a Chair and a Vice Chair of Mitzvah Day and has served on the Rabbinic Search Committee.

     In the wider community, Ms. Levin serves on the board of Georgetown Day School and was a member of the regional Board of the Anti-Defamation League. A graduate of Clark University, she received her J.D. from Boston University School of Law and an LLM in Taxation from New York University School of Law.

     Ms. Levin and her husband, Harvey, have four children: Adam. Lexi, Beth and her husband, Brian, and Robin and her husband, Evan, and four grandchildren, Asher and Andi Dubin and Max and Sophie Hammerman.

General Counsel: Richard A. Newman

     Richard Newman, a member of the Congregation for more than 20 years, is a partner at Arent Fox LLP, where his practice focuses on real estate and public finance, with an emphasis on the representation of tax exempt organizations.

     Mr. Newman has served as General Counsel to the Wolf Trap Foundation for the Performing Arts and for the Discovery Creek’s Children’s Museum, and is active in the National Association of Bond Lawyers and is a fellow of the American College of Real Estate Lawyers. He is also on the Board of the Arena Stage and the AIA Legacy Foundation.

     A graduate of New York University Mr. Newman received his law degree from Case Western Reserve University. Richard is married to Janice Newman, who has taught at the WHC’s Religious School for 20 years. Each of their children, Jessica, Joseph and Jacob works or has worked as a teacher or an aide in Religious School. 5