This year, we opened the Janet and Stephen Kirsch Safety Center, the first of its kind in Israel, and possibly in the world

When she’s not working as an alternative medicine practitioner in Ramat Beit Shemesh, she’s developing and expanding the safety initiatives of the organization she heads: Keren Yosef/Safety Israel

Beginnings

MY mother, Devora Mainzer a”h, founded Keren Yosef in 1998 and named it after my late father. When my father had needed urgent medical care, some months after they made aliyah from England in 1997, it typically took an ambulance forty-five minutes to reach him because at the time, there was only one MADA ambulance servicing the entire Beit Shemesh area. Hatzalah Beit Shemesh was in its formative stages and Ichud Hatzalah had not yet been founded. My parents of course found this very disturbing and wanted to do something about it.

Unfortunately, my father passed away from a heart condition only a year after their Aliyah, but my mother had a vision — to improve emergency medical care for everyone — and she started working on founding Keren Yosef as soon as she got up from sitting shivah.

Keren Yosef raised funds and donated advanced life-saving equipment to first responders and emergency medical personnel in Bet Shemesh and arranged training for many new volunteers. Within several months, a change could be seen and soon the average emergency response time decreased to four minutes. She partnered with emergency service providers and local community and chesed organizations and began to donate medical equipment to yishuvim throughout the country.

Thanks to generous supporters, Keren Yosef was able to donate a multi-casualty mobile emergency unit, a mobile emergency response control room for the fire and rescue services, as well as four ambulettes providing three runs a day transporting patients and their families between Bet Shemesh and the Jerusalem hospitals. We also donated defibrillators to shuls, communal buildings, and tourist sites including the Kotel, M’earas HaMachpelah, the Churva Shul, and Kever Rashbi. Hundreds of members of the public have also been trained in Keren Yosef's CPR and first aid courses.

My mother showed just how much every Oleh Chadash can contribute in Israel. Her basic Ivrit didn't hold her back — she could always get her message through. She was a people person and got along with every one of every age, background, hashkafah, or religious level. It didn’t matter who you were, she just cared about you. Sadly, she passed away in 2005 just six years after starting Keren Yosef. Although she left very big shoes to fill, I knew I had follow on the path of my dear mother and do my best to carry on her incredible work and legacy. It just seemed natural — and so I found myself chairperson of Keren Yosef.