Rhode Island’s Heath Equity Zone Initiative
In 2015, the Rhode Island Department of Health (RIDH) launched the Health Equity Zone (HEZ) initiative with the goal to make sustainable gains in health equity. Rethinking “business as usual”— the HEZ model addresses removing unnecessary barriers to strong community engagement. Instead of a “top-down” approach, the HEZ initiative is a health equity-centered approach to prevention that uses place-based, community-led solutions to address the social determinants of health.
Health Equity Zones are identified geographic areas where opportunities to address the health inequities through investment in community exist. Each HEZ is led by a community-based collaborative that conducts an assessment to identify, describe, and prioritize inequities of importance to the community, and develops and puts in place an action plan to address root causes of health inequities.
The HEZ initiative is strategically designed to resolve inefficiencies inherent in traditional prevention work, and to create measurable gains in health equity at the state and local levels. With RIDH encouragement, each HEZ “braids” funding from multiple sources of support from government and foundations. Based on Rhode Island’s success, states such as Washington and cities such as Chicago have launched HEZ initiatives.
Pawtucket Central Falls Health Equity Zone
Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) Rhode Island is the local office of a national nonprofit organization that invests in affordable housing, early childcare facilities, health equity, education, public safety, and workforce development. The RI Department of Health selected LISC Rhode Island as the backbone organization for the Pawtucket Central Falls Health Equity Zone because of its track record in place-based, resident-led approaches to achieving health equity, and its history in collaborating with government and non-profit partners.
The Pawtucket Central Falls HEZ includes more than 40,000 residents with a large percentage of immigrants or refugees from Africa, and Central and South America. Its residents face serious financial, educational and access challenges, and, according to 2015 data, almost twice as many HEZ residents live in poverty (31.3%) compared to all RI residents (13.6%).
In 2016, LISC and its 40-plus partner organizations and residents shared a vision to transform Pawtucket and Central Falls into thriving cities with equitable access to safe streets, parks, recreational areas, affordable housing, and healthy food, and designed programs to meet these goals. During the pandemic, the HEZ expanded its work to provide COVID-19 services—greatly needed because Pawtucket was a COVID-19 hotspot. Recently, the HEZ has been working to prevent opioid and other drug addictions.
Newport Health Equity Zone
The Newport HEZ is a place-based initiative focusing on the North End and Broadway neighborhoods, which are the city’s most racially diverse communities. Its goals are to reduce current health disparities present in these communities and to empower residents with the skills to create community change.
Serving as the “backbone” organization, the Women’s Resource Center coordinates the Newport HEZ to ensure a broad range of community-driven opportunities. Its first order of business in 2015 was to launch a resident-led data collection effort. Using data collected from a Question Campaign, the Newport HEZ established working groups to address community-identified priorities including transportation, physical and mental health, open space, arts and culture, education, innovation and economic opportunity, and food access and nutrition. Each working group includes a lead organization working with community participants.
Since establishing these Working Groups, the Newport HEZ has made considerable progress in each of these areas and has added additional working groups addressing LGBTQIA + Health; and leadership development among women of color. The HEZ was also instrumental in the Newport community navigating the COVID-19 waters and responding to other emergencies.
Click Below to Learn More About the Health Equity Work Done in Rhode Islands' HEZs
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |