A major street in downtown Miami has officially been renamed Chabad Street, co-designated through both a Miami-Dade County resolution and a City of Miami resolution.

The initiative was led by a non-Jewish state representative who has built and genuinely enjoys a close relationship with the Jewish community in Downtown Miami.

“She loves the community, and she loves the Rebbe,” says Rabbi Eli Lipksar, one of the shluchim serving the Downtown Miami and Brickell Jewish community. “She asked us what name would give the Rebbe the most nachas. We chose Chabad.”

The newly designated block is directly outside the Rok Family Shul – Chabad Downtown Jewish Center, which has been serving the Downtown Miami and Brickell Jewish community for more than twenty years.

The building itself makes a statement. Covered in Jerusalem stone, with a fully lit menorah visible from the street, it stands proudly in the heart of the city.

“We don’t hide who we are,” Rabbi Lipksar says. “The Rebbe taught us to add light to the world. You can’t add light if you’re hiding. We have to be proud, visible Yidden.”

Rabbi Lipksar also shared a remarkable story of hashgacha pratis that unfolded during the construction of the shul involving this non-Jewish representative, which still leaves him amazed to this day.

At one point during the construction, a small technical land issue surfaced. A narrow sliver of property in the zoning records appeared to overlap with a neighboring lot. Resolving it through the normal legal process could have taken as long as two and a half years, potentially delaying the project significantly.

“I was sitting in the meeting, and I was nervous,” Rabbi Lipksar recalls. “She told me, ‘Rabbi, when you have trouble, you pray. Go pray.’”

A short while later, she called him back.

“She said, ‘Rabbi, I personally went back through 100 years of zoning documents and found an old record showing that sliver of land as part of your property. I’m going to grandfather it in.’”

With that discovery, the lengthy replatting process was avoided.

When Rabbi Lipksar later asked her what motivated her involvement, she shared that she receives his weekly emails and reads the Divrei Torah.

“You never know how you can impact somebody,” Rabbi Lipksar says.

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