The Jerusalem Storefront operates in the heart of the Katamon neighbourhood since 1993, guaranteeing that people are able to acquire up-to-date information about existing social and economic rights, and increasing their ability to access those rights. We assist over 2000 residents per year in a variety of fields, including public and private housing, work, rights of the elderly, single parent families, immigrants, social security, municipality, health, education, debts and more. The storefront is the center of our activities aimed first and foremost at the residents of the community, but the general public of Jerusalem is assisted by its services as well.

The storefront routinely deals with issues which arise in interactions with public institutions and offices. For example, as part of our work we will help a worker realize her income support benefits at the National Insurance Institute, we will assist a public housing tenant write a petition to the housing company so that they repair deficiencies in his apartment (as the law requires) and clarify an inexplicit debt a consumer owes a cellular phone company.

Following the implementation of the Welfare to Work program in Jerusalem in 2005, the storefront has reorganized to receive complaints of program participants whose rights have been violated and  to provide them with personal aid. This reorganization was done under the framework of our Welfare-to-Work-Watch. We help participants write appeals on decisions they were negatively affected by and complaint letters concerning mistreatment by program counsellors. This way we restore stipends that were wrongfully revoked, change personal plans unsuitable to the participants abilities, obtain referrals to the profession committee, replace mistreating program staff, obtain funds for afterschool programs for the children of participants and much more.
In addition, we work to recognize fundamental common issues which arise from these individual complaints concerning the welfare-to-work program, and to deal with them collectively. These issues range from poor physical conditions in program courses, summer camps for children, undue referrals to community service, to juristic representation for participants in appeal committees.

We receive many petitions in other work-related issues as well, especially from contractor employees, concerning workers rights. We are prepared to give the full length of assistance and information in demanding these rights from employers, for example, in receiving basic entitlements such as lay-off compensations, health pensions and payslips.

In the past few years many Ethiopian immigrants have joined the neighbourhood, and we worked to include them in the storefront activity. Indeed, many issues have risen, such as confusion over bureaucratic procedures and neighbour disputes. In order to assist non-Hebrew-speaking immigrants, a representative of the storefront staff receives complaints at the welfare office once a week, in cooperation with their Amharic speaking worker who assists in translation. It is possible to receive service at the storefront in Russian and Arabic as well.

G  Back to Storefront Advocacy Centers