Fund for the City of New York

Through its Building Healthy Communities priority area, NYHealth has supported neighborhood-level approaches to improve access to healthy, affordable food and to activate spaces to encourage more physical activity.

Recognizing that sustainable resident engagement is vital to community health, NYHealth is supporting its Building Healthy Communities grantees to ensure that the residents of these neighborhoods have the leadership skills, resources, and other tools needed to advocate for community health. With this support, grantees can help remove barriers to resident participation and ensure the long-term sustainability of the overall work in these communities. In 2020, NYHealth awarded the Fund for the City of New York a grant to help residents of the Near Westside neighborhood in Syracuse activate public spaces for teen-focused community activities.

Under this grant, the Fund for the City of New York’s Center for Court Innovation helped neighborhood youth, adult community leaders, and community-based partners form a Youth Impact Team and developed strategies for improving health and increasing resident engagement in Syracuse’s Near Westside neighborhood. The Youth Impact Team identified and activated public spaces for teen-focused community activities, events, and projects. It also provided neighborhood youth with leadership training, skills development, mentorships, and volunteer engagement strategies for working collaboratively to improve health, safety, and social cohesion in the Near Westside.