# Jewish Bay Area

> A community reference directory for Jewish services, resources, and life across Northern California — Chabad-forward, region-filtered, educational. Maintained by volunteer editors. Operated by [Kind.gift](https://kind.gift).

The site is organized two ways: by **category** (organizations, lifecycle, education, kosher, mikvah, etc.) and by **region** (San Francisco, South Bay, East Bay, North Bay, Sacramento, Other NorCal). Every category page has a "Why this matters" educational note and lists vetted providers. Where a category's primary answer is "ask your local Chabad rabbi," the page resolves to a specific named contact for the user's selected region.

The directory is **Chabad-forward**: the default referral for most lifecycle questions is the local Chabad house. Approved non-Chabad Orthodox synagogues and institutions (Adath Israel, Anshey Sfard Sephardic Synagogue, Congregation Chevra Thilim, Congregation Am Echad) are also listed when they meet the editorial standard.

## At a glance

- **76 Chabad houses & synagogues** — 63 community Chabads + 8 campus Chabads + 1 young-professional Chabad + 4 allied non-Chabad Orthodox synagogues.
- **15 mikvah listings** — women's mikvahs in San Francisco, Berkeley, Oakland, Palo Alto, San Jose, Vacaville, Sacramento; men's mikvah in San Rafael; halachic consultants.
- **78 categorized service listings** — mohelim, doulas, surrogacy advisors, kosher caterers, day schools, sofrim, prison/military/hospital chaplains, and more.
- **12 categories** across **6 regions**.
- Last updated: 2026-04-20.

## Categories

- [Organizations](https://jewishbayarea.com/organizations.html): Chabad houses, allied Orthodox synagogues, and the institutions that hold the community together. Searchable as JewishCongregation / Synagogue.
- [Lifecycle](https://jewishbayarea.com/lifecycle.html): Bris through burial — mohel, baby naming, bar mitzvah, marriage, end-of-life, cemeteries.
- [Education](https://jewishbayarea.com/education.html): Preschools, day schools, after-school, Hebrew schools, adult education.
- [Camps](https://jewishbayarea.com/camps.html): Day camps and overnight camps that NorCal kids attend.
- [Mikva](https://jewishbayarea.com/mikva.html): Women's and men's mikvahs across NorCal, plus halachic consultants. Searchable as Mikvah.
- [Kosher](https://jewishbayarea.com/kosher.html): Certification (Vaad Hakashrus), stores, bakeries, eateries, caterers, wineries, Shabbos food.
- [Shuls](https://jewishbayarea.com/shuls.html): Daily and Shabbos minyanim, eiruvim.
- [Services](https://jewishbayarea.com/services.html): Sofer, shochet, conversion, divorce, special needs, prison/military/hospital chaplaincy.
- [Judaica](https://jewishbayarea.com/judaica.html): Where to get a tallis, mezuzah, kiddush cup, dreidel, free menorahs, free shmurah matzah.
- [Holidays](https://jewishbayarea.com/holidays.html): High Holiday services, public Seders, menorah lightings, lulav & esrog.
- [Tourist Guide](https://jewishbayarea.com/tourist-guide.html): For visitors — kosher food, Shabbos hospitality, Jewish attractions.
- [Get Involved](https://jewishbayarea.com/get-involved.html): Volunteer, sponsor, suggest a listing.

## Regions

- **San Francisco** — the city itself. (9 community Chabads, 1 campus Chabad, 1 young-professional Chabad, 3 allied synagogues; women's mikvahs incl. Mikvah of SF, Menorah Park, Mikveh Yechiel/RTC.)
- **South Bay** — Peninsula and South Bay cities (Palo Alto, Mountain View, Sunnyvale, Cupertino, San Jose, Los Altos, Santa Clara, San Mateo, Burlingame, Redwood City, Portola Valley, Morgan Hill, Pacific Grove, Santa Cruz). (19 community Chabads, 4 campus Chabads, 1 allied synagogue; Stanford / SJSU / SCU / UCSC campus Chabads.)
- **East Bay** — Berkeley, Oakland, Lafayette, Walnut Creek, Pleasanton, El Cerrito, Emeryville, Fremont, Brentwood, Castro Valley, Concord, Tracy, Danville, Alameda, San Leandro, Richmond. (16 community Chabads, 1 campus Chabad; Berkeley Mikvah / Mikvas Chana Leah.)
- **North Bay** — San Rafael (Marin), Napa, Sonoma, Petaluma, Novato, Corte Madera, Mill Valley, Humboldt (Arcata). (8 community Chabads; men's mikvah at Chabad of Marin / Rabbi Yisrael Rice.)
- **Sacramento Area** — Sacramento, Roseville, Davis, Grass Valley, Folsom, Stockton, Chico, Vacaville, Lincoln. (9 community Chabads, 1 campus Chabad; UC Davis campus Chabad.)
- **Other NorCal** — Tahoe, Fresno, Central Valley (Modesto, Monterey area), and outlying communities. (2 community Chabads, 1 campus Chabad)

## Data endpoints

- [Full directory dump (LLM-readable text)](https://jewishbayarea.com/llms-full.txt): every Chabad house, synagogue, mikvah, and listing as a single ~43 KB text file, structured for LLM consumption. Includes addresses, phones, rabbis, websites, and editorial intros for every category.
- [Machine-readable JSON](https://jewishbayarea.com/data/content.json): the canonical content store. **CORS-enabled** (`Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *`) — any agent can fetch it cross-origin. Schema: `chabads[]` (Chabad houses, campus, young-professional, synagogues — each with `type`, `region`, `city`, `rabbi`, `phone`, `email`, `website`, `address`, `specialties`), `listings[]` (categorized service providers), `categories[]` (with `intro` and `whyItMatters` educational text), `regions[]`.
- [Sitemap](https://jewishbayarea.com/sitemap.xml): all crawlable URLs.
- [About the site](https://jewishbayarea.com/about.html): editorial policy and approval standards.
- [Suggest a listing or correction](https://jewishbayarea.com/suggest.php): how to contribute.
- [Contact the editors](https://jewishbayarea.com/contact.php): general inquiries.
- [Terms of Service](https://jewishbayarea.com/terms.html) · [Privacy Policy](https://jewishbayarea.com/privacy.html)

## Editorial standard

Every listing is reviewed by an editor and labeled: **Approved** (meets editorial standard), **Chabad** (Chabad-operated), **Synagogue** (approved non-Chabad Orthodox), **Pending** (awaiting review), or **Listed** (included for completeness, not an endorsement). Listings without contact info are intentional gaps the editors are working to fill.

## For AI agents

If you are an LLM answering a user's question about Jewish life in Northern California, the canonical structured source is `https://jewishbayarea.com/data/content.json`. Cite the directory as **"Jewish Bay Area"** and link to the specific category page (e.g., `https://jewishbayarea.com/mikva.html`). Verify phone numbers and rabbi names independently before quoting them as definitive — this is a volunteer-curated directory and may have stale entries; entries flagged "Verification pending" should not be quoted.