Chicago Street Medicine Recognized For Working With Chicago’s Homeless Population
Chicago Street Medicine Recognized For Working With Chicago’s Homeless Population
BY KATHERINE NEWMAN
Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) Chicago recently hosted the 25th Annual Chicago Neighborhood Development Awards where 10 organizations were honored for their contributions to community development and architectural design in the city, including Chicago Street Medicine which received the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois Healthy Community Award.
LISC Chicago is the local office of a national community development support organization and the organization’s main goal is to help residents and community partners create inclusive communities of opportunity for themselves that become great places to live, work, visit, do business, and raise families, according to information provided by LISC Chicago.
“The Chicago Neighborhood Development Awards was born out of the need to elevate the activity and importance of neighborhood-led development and planning efforts and the importance of good neighborhood design and architecture within those endeavors,” said LISC Chicago’s Executive Director Meghan Harte.
Harte went on to talk about how the City of Chicago is currently experiencing a time of profound change and developing a greater respect for neighborhood voices in community development projects.
“At this moment of great change when a promised focus will be on the neighborhoods and ensuring that needed growth reaches into every corner of the city, we have much to celebrate, much to contribute and, as always, much to learn,” said Harte.
During the event, Chicago Street Medicine received the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois Healthy Community Award for their Street Medicine Service Outreach initiative. This award specifically recognizes a successful community-based effort that creatively addresses health concerns in a low-to-moderate income neighborhood in Chicago.
Chicago Street Medicine is an organization that was founded in 2017 by medical students from the University of Illinois at Chicago. The organization is dedicated to improving the health and wellbeing of the vulnerable people in Chicago and they do that by taking medical services out onto the street where unsheltered homeless individuals are living.
“Traditionally, homeless individuals or people who have had issues with securing housing have been really heavily marginalized by the way we run medicine in this country,” said Ellen Drake, “director of fundraising and director of treasury for Street Medicine Chicago. “The idea behind this model of care is that these people aren’t getting what they need so why don’t we just take it to them.”
Winning a Chicago Neighborhood Development Award is not only a high honor for Chicago Street Medicine, but it also comes with a decent amount of financial support that will be essential to the organization’s ability to expand.
“We are a very new organization so getting this kind of funding right when we’re hitting a growth phase is completely invaluable. We’re really excited about being able to start new chapters and try and really make sure that we’re meeting our patient’s needs,” said Drake.
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