CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- Mayor Lightfoot joined the Chicago Department of Public Health and other city and community leaders on Thursday to declare that racism is a public health crisis in the City of Chicago.
Currently, in Chicago, the 9.2-year life expectancy gap between Black and non-Black Chicagoans, which has increased in the past decade, and the declining life expectancy rates of Asian and Latino Chicagoans requires a commitment by the city to build on its work to improve anti-racist policies that address the root causes of inequities disproportionately affecting the lives of all Chicagoans of color.
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"At almost every single point in our city's history, racism has taken a devastating toll on the health and wellbeing of our residents of color—especially those who are Black," said Mayor Lightfoot, in a statement. "Without formally acknowledging this detrimental impact, we will never be able to move forward as a city and fully provide our communities with the resources they need to live happy and healthy lives. That's why I am declaring racism as a public health crisis and looking forward to doubling down on both ongoing and new collaborations with City officials and community leaders to address the racist policies that have wreaked havoc on our Black and Latinx communities."
The announcement notes the different forms systemic racism has taken in U.S. history, from slavery to racialized violence, Jim Crow restrictions that codified segregation and denied all manner of rights to Black Americans, to redlining, racial covenants, and other forms of financial and housing segregation and discrimination. Chicago has its own history of racial violence, including the race riots of 1919 and violent attacks on a 1966 anti-segregation protest led by Dr. King. There were also decades of economic suppression, including redlining and restrictive covenants, and other policy and planning mandates that succeeded in segregating and isolating communities of color.
Mayor Lightfoot calls on the City of Chicago to improve anti-racist policies by:
• Building capacity for anti-racist leadership—cultivating visionary, strategic, and authentic leadership that can analyze the impacts of racial harm and inequities and is equipped to build sustainable solutions with communities most impacted by the problems.
• Reckoning with the impacts of racism—reflecting on how past racial inequalities were and continue to be produced and reclaiming our present engagements with the intention to transform the relationships, practices, policies, and systems that maintain these inequities.
• Advancing strategies to operationalize racial equity—building our internal infrastructure for change, cultivating a “will to act”, executing intentional tools and strategies that are differentiated to best meet the needs, and holding ourselves accountable to producing equitable results.
• Empowering transformative community relationships—designing fundamentally different structures of engagement and problem-solving that embrace shared governance; appropriately resourcing groups that are impacted most by racist structures to be key drivers in building and executing solutions.
With this action, the city joins the American Public Health Association, which has declared racism a public health crisis that needs immediate attention, as well as institutions including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, American Medical Association, American Association of Pediatrics, and American College of Emergency Physicians that have also recognized racism as an urgent threat to public health.
CDPH also announced that the department is allocating $9.6 million in COVID-19 relief funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to establish Healthy Chicago Equity Zones – six geographic areas covering the entire city that will be led by regional and community organizations. Relying on participatory, data-informed processes, these organizations will create community-based stakeholder coalitions to develop targeted strategies to improve community and individual wellness.
After a comprehensive selection and vetting process, CDPH selected the following lead organizations:
• Far South: Phalanx Family Services
• Near South: Greater Auburn Gresham Development Corporation
• North/Central: Swedish Covenant Hospital
• Northwest: Northwest Side Housing Center
• Southwest: Southwest Organizing Project
• West: Rush University Medical Center (on behalf of West Side United)
In 2020, CDPH launched Healthy Chicago 2025, a citywide plan to reduce the racial life expectancy gap with strategies that tackle the root causes of health. The department also recently hired its first Chief Racial Equity Officer and uses its Healthy Chicago Survey and Chicago Health Atlas to better connect with Chicagoans and make data more accessible.
Additionally, in response to the COVID-19 outbreak and the disproportionate impact on communities of color, the city created the Racial Equity Rapid Response Team (RERRT) and made a concerted effort throughout the pandemic to direct resources to the most impacted communities, using its COVID Community Vulnerability Index (CCVI) to assess areas most in need.
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