By Scott Cummings
At Care1st Health Plan Arizona, we value giving back to the
communities we serve. When we saw a growing need for human services in the
underserved Southwest Valley of Maricopa County, we seized the opportunity to
find a solution that would benefit not only our members in the area, but the
community as a whole.
During the Great Recession, the City of Avondale was hit
particularly hard. Approximately 20 percent of homes went into foreclosure and
a fragmented human services infrastructure could not fully support its growing
number of residents in need.
In 2009, we launched the Care1st Avondale Resource Center in
historic Avondale, Arizona through an innovative public-private partnership
with Care1st Health Plan Arizona, the City of Avondale and First Things First.
Our goal was to develop a facility that served as a safe environment for
families and children to connect to needed resources. The center is a one-stop
hub of social and human services including healthcare enrollment, Women,
Infants, and Children (WIC), parenting classes, financial literacy workshops,
job assistance and more.
The premise of the center is to provide quality, holistic
services and resources to promote positive health outcomes, greater
self-sufficiency and lower costs to the healthcare system. Currently, there are
69 community-based organizations delivering services out of the center and, on
average, 4,700 people walk through our doors every month.
The Care1st Avondale Resource Center would not be where it is
today without the extraordinary commitment of our core partners. Care1st Health
Plan Arizona provides annual operational costs and staff to support the
center’s day-to-day needs. The City of Avondale maintains the facility and
manages operations and staff. First Things First offers grants to support early
childhood education to prepare children from birth to five years old for
success in school.
In 2014, the Maricopa Association of Governments (MAG)
recognized the center with the “Desert Peaks Award” for providing outstanding
services to the community. Similarly, WESTMARC honored the center with the
“Best of the West Award” in 2010 for improving the quality of life of residents
in the West Valley.
We’re proud to be part of a family-center facility that will
continue to shape a better tomorrow for years to come.
Scott Cummings is the state president of Care1st Health Plan
Arizona
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