April 20, 2015
This past winter, Mayor de Blasio and the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) Commissioner Mary Bassett announced their plans to improve health equity and address long-standing health disparities through the revival of the District Public Health Offices and the expansion of NYC’s community health network.
One important element of the plan is the Neighborhood Health Hub Initiative, in which communities will engage in comprehensive planning efforts to determine their local health priorities and then leverage existing assets including community-based organizations and local leaders to help close the gap on health disparities.
DOHMH will provide physical space in District Public Health Office buildings to allow Community Based Organizations (CBOs), medical providers and other government agencies to co-locate and serve the community. The shared space will help foster community-level collaboration around population health concerns and bolster coordination of care, prevention education and disease management. The health hubs will be established in eight existing city-owned health buildings, located in Bedford, Brownsville, Bushwick, and Williamsburg in Brooklyn; Central Harlem and East Harlem in Manhattan; and Morrisania and Tremont in the Bronx.
As neighborhoods move forward with their community health planning processes, CCC encourages community members and providers to use CCC’s Keeping Track Online resource to help inform and tailor community public health plans.
CCC’s online tool allows you to map, chart and graph data by community and/or topic. Below are some examples of how the KT data could help health hubs with their planning:
In the spirit of achieving health equity in New York City, CCC encourages all communities to use Keeping Track Online as a resource to inform their community planning and activism. In addition to the aforementioned health indicators, this comprehensive and centralized database provides a wealth of data and statistics in the areas of housing and community life, early childhood education, education, youth services, economic conditions, and child welfare.