Anyone who has experienced the sense of panic that strikes when your oven dies the day before you are hosting a major holiday dinner can understand how important the Staenberg Anything Grant™ has been to Kavod Senior Life this past year.
Today, Kavod proudly shows off the new oven and dishwasher available in its kosher kitchen thanks to the generosity of the Staenberg Family Foundation. Applications are now open for 2026 Staenberg Anything Grants™.
With the new equipment, Kavod can not only serve high-quality meals to residents who require kosher, but it can also continue its long tradition of providing kosher dining to the wider community for Jewish holidays, celebrations, and special events.
“Passover is coming up soon and for folks who require kosher meals but don’t have a place to go or may not be affiliated with a synagogue or temple, they are more than welcome to attend our Seder,” says Gaile Weisbly Waldinger, Kavod’s Director of Development. “We are the only non-religious organization in Metro Denver that provides a kosher opportunity for residents and community members.”
“Staenberg Anything Grants™ are so nice because they understand specific Jewish requests,” adds Christie Ziegler, Kavod’s Director of Communication and Marketing. “It’s actually in the name of the grant—you can apply for ‘anything.’ The grant is flexible and not saddled with restrictions.”
Being ‘proactive instead of reactive’
One year ago, the Director of Dining came to Kavod’s President and CEO Michael Klein with an urgent concern. The commercial oven and dishwasher in the Kavod kosher kitchen were on their last legs. Both were so old that even long-term staff could not remember how old they were.
“Had they broken, we would have had to wait until new ones were ordered, arrived, and were installed,” says Weisbly Waldinger. “In the meantime, residents who require kosher food would be eating kosher TV dinners.”
Those TV dinners certainly would not meet Kavod’s mission of accommodating residents and the community at the highest level with fresh, well-balanced meals. No oven in the kosher kitchen would also seriously compromise holidays like Sukkot at Kavod, when anyone can come to a service and then go into the sukkah for a kosher celebration.
“The Staenberg Anything Grant™ enabled us to prioritize this project,” says Weisbly Waldinger. “We could be proactive instead of reactive.”
The grant also provided Kavod with an opportunity for a win-win. For years, the interconnected multi-building campus, which straddles a busy street, had been accommodating a kosher kitchen in its West Building when the majority of the diners ate in the East Building. The solution had long been to have staff push the food in trolleys across the street regardless of weather. In the middle of winter, food that started out hot in the West Building kitchen did not always land on plates still hot in the East Building dining room.
With the grant that enabled purchase of a new oven and dishwasher, Kavod came up with a wonderful solution. The new appliances were installed in the East Building kitchen, and the days of pushing food through rain, sleet, and snow came to an end.
“We are so grateful that with one Staenberg Anything Grant™ we could solve two problems,” says Ziegler. “It also saved us from spending money on very important and expensive equipment. In a year of ups and downs with federal subsidies, having funding from the Staenberg Family Foundation means we can continue to serve residents and their needs without sacrificing somewhere else.”
The ‘icing on the cake’
In 2025, there were 16 recipients of Staenberg Anything Grants™, receiving $78,600 to support projects and programs within Colorado’s Jewish community. Anything Grants™ are funded by the Staenberg Family Foundation and administered by JEWISHcolorado.
Staenberg Anything Grants™ are one-time matching grants of up to $5,000 each, covering up to 50% of a project’s total cost. These grants support targeted improvements within Jewish nonprofit organizations throughout the state.
“I am proud to offer these grants in partnership with JEWISHcolorado to help inspire others to give,” says philanthropist Michael Staenberg. “These grants are proof that even smaller grants can make a world of difference for local organizations.”
Since 2018, Staenberg has given $466,000 in local “Anything Grants” to more than 120 Colorado Jewish nonprofit organizations.
In addition to Kavod Senior Life, the 2025 recipients included B’nai Havurah, Denver Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation, BMH-BJ Preschool, Bright Lights Early Learning Center, Chabad of NW Metro Denver, CU Boulder Hillel, The Golda Meir House Museum, Har Mishpacha: Jewish Congregation of Steamboat Springs, Hillel of Colorado for CSU Hillel, Israeli American Council, Jewish Family Service of Colorado, Jewish Resource Center – Chabad of Aspen, Mikvah of East Denver, Ramah in the Rockies, Temple Beit Torah (TBT), and Unifying Meditation Institute.
For all these organizations, a single grant—which often inspires and incentivizes other grants—can make a huge financial difference.
“The Department of Housing and Urban Development provides us with subsidies at Kavod,” says Weisbly Waldinger. “I call that the ‘cake.’ Everything that we do in development with donations and grants is the icing. We are more than just a roof over people’s heads. We provide a variety of services. The Staenberg Anything Grant™ has helped us add icing to our cake.”