Friday, May 9, 2025
5/9/2025
Community Project Funding/Congressionally Directed Spending - Construction - The Austin Community Health Hub will be a healing, welcoming space for youth and families to seek clinical care and community-based services. The facility will provide high-quality pediatric specialty physical and behavioral healthcare services; community-responsive health education and training; gathering space for youth development and other community organizations; outdoor space for programming and respite; and a coffee shop/café to encourage community building and to help revitalize Chicago Avenue’s Soul City Corridor. In addition to its operations, the design and construction of this facility will promote healing and focus on advancing health equity on the West Side of Chicago. Youth and community residents will be engaged every step along the way to ensure it reflects them and their desires for the future. The Austin community of Chicago has suffered for decades from disinvestment. As a result, it ranks “Very Low” on the Childhood Opportunity Index, which combines 29 indicators across the domains of education, health and environment, and social and economic. In Austin, the infant mortality rate is 1.5 times higher than city average; gun-related deaths are twice as high as the city average, and opioid overdose deaths are 2.5 times higher than the city average. The Austin Community Health Hub is a collaborative project between Stone Community Development Corporation (Stone CDC), Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago (Lurie Children’s) and the Austin community. Stone CDC provides families in the Austin community opportunities to grow and develop academically, spiritually and financially through programs including STEAM, career pathways, music and art, and reading/writing development. Lurie Children’s is consistently ranked the top children’s hospital in the state and one of the best in the nation, and its clinicians care for more than 200,000 children and adolescents each year. Lurie Children’s also serves more youth insured by Medicaid than any other hospital in Illinois. This collaboration and project was developed in response to Austin youth and family residents’ expressed needs through meetings, events, and focus groups. It aligns with specific goals articulated through the Austin community’s 2018 Quality of Life Plan, which include providing more mental health and wraparound services for youth, creating environments that foster health and wellness, and supporting the revitalization of Chicago Avenue’s Soul City Corridor. The project site is located at 5046-5048 W Chicago Avenue, a vacant parcel acquired by Stone CDC from the Cook County Land Bank Authority for this project. The building will be approximately 15,000 square feet total, with 5,000 square feet each for: (1) Lurie Children’s clinical exam rooms to support pediatric specialty care services; and behavioral health offices and group therapy rooms; (2) Lurie Children’s Magoon Institute for Healthy Communities’ community-responsive health education, training and programming programs for youth and families; and (3) Stone CDC programs, community partner space, coffee shop/café and outdoor space. The total estimated cost of the project is $7.5 million. In addition to Congressionally-Directed Spending, funds are coming from Stone CDC and Lurie Children’s philanthropic partners, new market tax credits and local government.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).