Holy Blossom Temple’s Privacy Policy

Your Privacy Rights

Holy Blossom Temple (“Holy Blossom”) recognizes the importance of privacy and the sensitivity of personal information. We take seriously our obligation to keep this information confidential and we protect it with physical, electronic and procedural safeguards. In order to comply with applicable privacy legislation and to instil confidence in our members and potential members that the personal information they entrust to us is safe, we have developed this Privacy Policy.

“Personal Information” means information about an identifiable individual but does not include the name, title, business address or telephone number of any employee of any organization. Holy Blossom collects financial and contact information from you in respect of yourself and your family members.

Why Does Holy Blossom Collect Personal Information From You?

Holy Blossom collects personal information from you so that we can provide our members and our community with a range of services and activities, which include:

Yahrzeit reminders and aliyot
Bulletin and general notices and mailings
General announcements, including life cycle events, illness and death of family members
Assignment to dues category
Youth activity announcements
Dues collection
Membership privileges
Membership status determination
Our fundraising efforts
Brotherhood and Sisterhood programs and activities
To generally communicate with our members and their spouses and family members
To understand and assess the needs and requirements of our members and potential members and offering services, programming and events to meet those needs
As applicable, to assist the Holy Blossom Nursery School and Supplementary School in providing educational services to students
To the extent that you have expressly elected to support affiliated Reform Judaism organizations (through our voluntary contribution program), Holy Blossom may provide such organizations with your contact information

Please note that membership in Holy Blossom automatically entitles you to membership in the Union for Reform Judaism, with which we share your contact information.

Membership in a religious community brings with it certain “understandings”, one of which is that certain information or news about members and their life cycle events will be shared with the community. We will continue to share this sort of information unless we are notified that it is not to be shared.

How Do We Collect Your Personal Information

We collect information only by lawful and fair means and not indiscriminately. We may collect personal information directly from you when you become a member of Holy Blossom, or during the term of your membership. We may on occasion obtain information about you from other sources, such as other family members or members of Holy Blossom.

Consent

Consent for the collection, use and/or disclosure of personal information may be obtained orally or in writing and may be expressly given or implied. We may also from time to time ask you to give your written consent to the use and disclosure of specific personal information. In determining how we obtain your consent, we will take into account the sensitivity of your personal information that we are collecting, using and/or disclosing. We will use and disclose your personal information only in accordance with this policy.

If You Do Not Consent

The choice to provide us with personal information is always up to you. Upon request, we will explain your options of refusing or withdrawing consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information and will record and respect your written choices. However, your decision to withhold particular details may limit our ability to provide our services to you. This measure is necessary to protect the integrity of the services offered by Holy Blossom. Furthermore, any refusing or withdrawing of consent is always subject to any overriding legal requirements or commitments.

Disclosure of Your Personal Information

Under certain circumstances Holy Blossom may disclose your personal information without your consent:

when we in good faith believe the law requires or authorizes us to do so, including reporting to Canada Revenue Agency of donations received
when the services that you have expressly requested from us require us to give your information to third parties (for example, to a funeral parlour, caterer, educator, non-employed clergy) your consent will be implied unless you tell us otherwise
where it is necessary to establish or collect dues or contributions
if the information is already publicly known

We never make our membership list available to third parties in any form, except as set out in this document or unless we have your prior consent. Personal information provided to third party service providers (such as accountants, computer back-up services, or archival file storage) with whom we have contractual arrangements will have comparable levels of protection to the internal protection which Holy Blossom maintains for personal information.

Is My Personal Information Secure?

Holy Blossom takes all reasonable precautions to ensure that your personal information is kept safe from loss, unauthorized access, modification or disclosure. Among the steps taken to protect your information, depending on its type and sensitivity, are:

premises security
restricted access to personal information
deploying technological safeguards such as security software and firewalls to prevent hacking or unauthorized computer access
internal password and security policies
where necessary or appropriate, by requiring third parties to sign a confidentiality agreement

As Holy Blossom is responsible for any personal information under its control, including personal information that Holy Blossom may transfer to a third party for processing, we will use contractual or other means to provide a comparable level of privacy protection when personal information is being processed by a third party on Holy Blossom’s behalf.

Updating Your Information

Since we use your personal information to provide services to you, it is important that the information be accurate and up-to-date. If any of the information changes, or if you should become aware that the personal information which we have is incorrect, please inform us so that we can make the necessary changes.

Access to Your Personal Information

You may request access to any personal information we hold about you. Summary information is available on written request. More detailed requests that require archive, retrieval or copying costs may be subject to reasonable reimbursement for our actual costs.

Can I be Denied Access to My Personal Information?

Your rights to access your personal information are not absolute. We may deny access when:

denial of access is required or authorized by law or the rules of a formal dispute resolution process, such as a Beth Din
information relates to existing or anticipated legal proceedings against you
granting you access would have an unreasonable impact on other people’s privacy
to do so would prejudice negotiations with you
to protect Holy Blossom’s rights and property
the request is frivolous or vexatious

If we deny your request for access, or refuse a request to correct information, we will explain why.

How Long Do You Keep My Personal Information?

We retain your personal information for as long as you are a member and afterwards for as long as is reasonably necessary for us to complete our dealings with you, or as may be required by law or for purpose of compliance with our religious obligations. Because synagogue records are often a valuable source of information which may be required for halachic or genealogical purposes, selected items of personal information may be retained indefinitely.

Web Site

Our Web site, www.holyblossomstg.wpengine.com, may contain links to other sites which are not governed by this privacy policy. While no specific personal information is retained with respect to any visitor to our website, we may monitor traffic patterns, site usage and related site information to optimise our web service. In the continuing development of our website we may provide aggregated information to third parties, but these statistics do not contain any identifiable personal information. Personal information will not be posted on any of our digital channels.

Communicating with Us

E-mail is not a 100% secure medium and you should be aware of this when contacting us to send personal or confidential information.

Changes to this Privacy Policy

This policy is effective January 1, 2004. Since Holy Blossom regularly reviews all of its policies and procedures, we may change our Privacy Policy from time to time. Please refer to our website for revisions and updates.

Requests for Access

If you have any questions, wish to review your personal information, comment on this policy or make a complaint, please contact our Executive Director who is our privacy officer at:

Holy Blossom Temple
1950 Bathurst Street
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
M5P 3K9

fax (416) 789-9697

Click here to send an email to the Executive Director