In a few months, northern Virginians will be able to consult one app to find out what’s happening in the region’s Jewish community.

JLive, a digital platform designed to make discovering and sharing Jewish events “easier than ever,” is set to launch in northern Virginia in fall 2026. The effort was led by the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington and the Pozez JCC of Northern Virginia.

“We believe it’s really important for the northern Virginia community to have a central meeting place for all of the events across the community in one central hub,” said Vanessa Sax, the Federation’s senior director of strategy and community building for northern Virginia.

“I think we’re really poised to make an exciting step forward in terms of Jewish engagement here in northern Virginia,” said Jeff Dannick, the Pozez JCC’s executive director.

JLive, which is similar to platforms such as Ticketmaster or Eventbrite, will be managed by both the local Federation and the Pozez JCC, according to Dannick. “We’re the conveners,” he said.

The platform was launched in 2020 by the Detroit and Montreal Jewish Federations to “break through the silo of Jewish events and newsletters” and create an “easy entry into Jewish life.”

Years ago, Dannick learned about JLive through the CEO of Detroit’s JCC at a conference, and a light bulb went off in his head.

He realized, “That would be perfect for northern Virginia because we’re so spread out and we don’t have a gravitational center of force that brings all the Jewish community together in one place.”

Northern Virginia spans about 1,300 square miles — more than twice the total area of Montgomery County — with one of the fastest growing Jewish populations in the country.

“We needed that connective tissue,” Dannick said of the region.

Jewish communal organizations and synagogues primarily based in northern Virginia, but also in greater Washington, will serve as the local JLive’s participating organizations.

“It may be Sixth & I or Theater J because people in northern Virginia also go to D.C. or Maryland for programming, as well,” Dannick said.

He and the Federation team are in the process of conducting outreach to prospective participating organizations. The next stage is for them to develop that list of organizations and train each of them on how to input programming into JLive. Once the platform is active, the Federation and Pozez JCC will employ their public relations marketing strategy.

“At that point, we will be pushing it out to the general public, and then, word of mouth will spread,” Dannick said.

Since 2020, JLive has launched in Miami, Cincinnati and Ann Arbor, Michigan, and is in the process of rolling out in other communities.

Users can set up profiles to receive tailored events. For instance, a user who registers for a PJ Library event will be recommended other young family events.

Users can search for events by geographical location, area of interest and demographic information to find local Jewish events or programs, book their tickets on the platform and tell their friends about the event, according to Dannick.

He spoke to the platform’s “robust social media connectivity.”

“If somebody signs up for a program on JLive, they can very easily let all the people on their Facebook and Instagram or whatever platform know that they’re going to this event and ask them if they want to come and join,” Dannick said. “It’ll create this momentum of awareness of what programs are out there.”

While the Federation maintains the Jewish Greater Washington Community Calendar online and GatherDC similarly keeps a Jewish DMV Calendar, JLive is unique in that it’s specific to northern Virginia, Sax said.

It’s also more user-friendly than a Facebook group — another hub for sharing events within communities — because some community members don’t have social media accounts, said Sax, who doesn’t use Facebook.

JLive not only benefits community members seeking Jewish programming, but the organizational partners themselves through data collection, according to Sax.

The platform collects anonymized information about JLive event registrants. “You can run a report to say, ‘For [Jewish] people in northern Virginia in their 40s, where are they going?’” Sax said.

“That will give us real insight into what is actually in real time happening in our community and what people are engaging with,” she added. “And we don’t have that access right now [with our current systems].”

Sax said she hopes that JLive serves as a “central repository” for Jewish events, connecting community members to one another and the larger northern Virginian community.

Dannick and Sax are working on putting the JLive strategy together and mapping out a timeframe for its public launch. They expect to introduce JLive to the community in the fall, followed by a larger public launch shortly after.

“By the time we get to Chanukah, hopefully the entire community in northern Virginia will know what JLive is [and] know how to get on to JLive,” Dannick said. “And when they do, they’re going to find, hopefully, many, many organizations that are posting their Chanukah activities on JLive.”

zbell@midatlanticmedia.com