Board taps Goelman as interim director

Andrew Glazer

COSTA MESA -- She loathes being put on hold.

Aviva Goelman, who was recently appointed interim director of the

Costa Mesa Senior Center, rolled her eyes and fidgeted as she waited to

talk to the supervisor of a refrigerator repairman who didn’t show up.

“Can you imagine this?” she seethed. “I won’t take that!”

Goelman will be the center’s first director since Alan M. Meyers was

fired in May for allegedly spending much of his career impersonating

doctors and embezzling money from health clinics and nonprofits across

the country.

Goelman will assume her new duties Aug. 2.

Born in Israel and raised in Montreal, the Newport Coast resident said

she can be tough when she wants to get something done.

“That’s the Israeli in me,” she explained.

But Goelman also has a warm, comfortable smile, a sweet Shih Tzu named

Ashlee and a desire to spend many hours at the senior center’s lunch

tables, chatting with members who use the facility.

“I don’t want them to think I’m untouchable,” said Goelman, who is the

mother of two grown children. “There’s been a communication gap and a

lack of trust between the board, staff and the seniors.”

Costa Mesa City Councilwoman Linda Dixon, who is a member of the

center’s hiring committee, said she expects Goelman to win back the trust

and confidence of the senior center’s members.

“She’s willing to interact,” she said. “She wants to work with the

seniors and find out their interests and concerns. But she will have to

work to build a relationship.”

Goelman actually paid the center an incognito visit last week with her

79-year-old mother, Margit Klauber. The two had lunch with a group of

seniors who said they felt frustrated and intimidated by the senior

center’s board.

“I wanted to just listen in and find out what the seniors were

feeling,” she said.

Goelman was active for more than 15 years in the Ruth Kahn Jewish

Senior Center, which is now based at the Jewish Community Center. Most

recently, she has managed Early Years Toys, a store in Newport Beach. The

store will close at the end of the summer.

As interim director, Goelman will run the center while the hiring

committee of the center’s board of directors sifts through dozens of

resumes. The committee pledges to check the background of each applicant,

which will include face-to-face interviews with former employers.

“Whether it takes two months or four months, we will make sure we

cover all the bases and feel comfortable and confident with the new

director,” Dixon said.

Goelman hopes that she will be named the center’s permanent executive

director: “This is the job I’ve been waiting for!”

She also got something else she was waiting for.

After being bounced from supervisor to on-hold music to supervisor for

nearly an hour, Goelman secured an evening appointment with the

refrigerator repairman.

PERSONAL PROFILE

NAME: Aviva Goelman

RESIDES: Newport Coast

FAMILY: Son, Eric; daughter, Susan; mother, Margit Klauber

HOBBIES: Watching Mighty Ducks of Anaheim hockey games and Anaheim

Angels baseball games, reading books -- she’s currently in the middle of

“The Book of Ruth” by Jane Hamilton -- and spending time with her family.