Rabbi Mendy Kraus can often be found among the summer crowds wandering the boardwalk in Asbury Park, Belmar or Bradley Beach, but he is not looking to win a stuffed animal for his children at an arcade or stepping off the beach for a cold drink.

Rather, he is looking for Jews among the crowds interested in wrapping tefillin or learning more about Judaism as they take in the summer fun of the shops, eateries, games and rides of the Jersey Shore.

You can find his mitzvah mobile parked beside the boardwalk when Rabbi Kraus is not out spreading his love of Judaism.

Rabbi Kraus is the director with his wife, Sarah, of the new Chabad of Bradley Beach Belmar and Asbury Park. They are tasked with reaching out to Jewish communities there and in Ocean Grove. Programs and activities will be conducted from the couple’s home in Bradley Beach.

“Literally we are just walking around and people are just coming over pretty excited to meet us,” the rabbi said. “And we are excited too.”

The couple and their two girls and two boys—Mushka, 6; Yehudit, 4; Dovid, 2 and Tzvi, 1—are just moving into their shore home from Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Already, they’ve met a visiting Israeli family on the boardwalk, conducted several bar and bat mitzvahs—including one of a 59-year-old man—and welcomed visitors into their mitzvah mobile.

Even though they were commuting between Brooklyn and the Shore, the couple began establishing a presence around Purim when they came to distribute mishloach manot and meet people on the street.

As he spoke on the phone Rabbi Kraus said he was walking along the boardwalk in Belmar seeking Jews to wrap tefillin. Among his plans is bringing a mitzvah mobile to the Neptune ShopRite.

Rabbi Kraus noted there are several already-established synagogues in these communities and his activities will not conflict with their membership. “We plan to work with the shuls, but we’re mostly focused on unaffiliated Jews. We’re not coming to replace them.”

One of the areas the couple would like to particularly concentrate on is Asbury Park, which once had a significant Jewish population that largely abandoned the city as it became riddled with crime and drugs. However, the cache of Bruce Springsteen and a large-scale regentrification have turned it into a major draw for culture, niche shops and dining, bringing back the middle class, including Jews, most of whom appear to be unaffiliated.

The new Chabad will join 10 others as part of Chabad of Central New Jersey affiliated with Rabbi Yosef Carlebach, the executive director of Rutgers Chabad. Rabbi Carlebach has been a firsthand witness to the changing demographics in the area.

Congregation Sons of Israel, which began in Asbury Park almost a century earlier, was forced to abandon its building in the late 1980s as the city’s Jewish community dwindled and the neighborhood became dangerous. As its longtime religious leader, Rabbi Carlebach recalled “people were getting mugged in shul” and evening services and activities had to be largely discontinued.

The shul held services, religious school and activities in the Hillel Yeshiva until 2013 when it moved into a newly constructed building in the Wayside section of Ocean Township. It is now Congregation Sons of Israel-Chabad of Greater Monmouth County.

“Since I started I have seen a demographic change in the whole area and we see this unmet need,” said Rabbi Carlebach, who described Rabbi Kraus as “young” and “eager.”

Rabbi Kraus studied in yeshiva in Israel and received his rabbinical certificate in Rishon LeZion. He later studied at Chabad headquarters. The couple previously started a Chabad in Tulum, Mexico.

Sarah Kraus, who grew up in Flatbush, Brooklyn, has been a preschool and elementary teacher, and until last year, was full-time at a Chabad-run school. She said she plans to first focus on establishing a women’s circle in the Belmar area. Future plans include establishing a Hebrew school.

Sarah has a lifelong involvement with Chabad through her parents—her father, Rabbi Zalman Liberow, is director of the Chabad of Flatbush. “The goals right now are to do all the nice programming, the cooking, the challah-baking before yontif,” she said. “First I want to see what the area needs.”

Rabbi Kraus can be reached at chabadbelmar@gmail.com or (347) 770-2817.

Debra Rubin has had a long career in journalism writing for secular weekly and daily newspapers and Jewish publications. She most recently served as Middlesex/Monmouth bureau chief for the New Jersey Jewish News. She also worked with the media at several nonprofits, including serving as assistant public relations director of HIAS and assistant director of media relations at Yeshiva University.