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Housing as a Foundation for Good Health
The 2019 County Health Rankings take a closer look at how a secure, affordable home is a critical foundation for good health. In this webinar we explored the connection between housing and health and how where we live affects how well and how long we live. Sarah Norman, Director of Healthy Homes & Communities with NeighborWorks America, highlighted the ways in which partnerships among...
How a Low Ranking on Health Mobilized Wyandotte County
When Wyandotte County, Kansas finished dead last in a 2009 health rankings study, Mayor Joe Reardon wanted some answers.
The Kansas County Health Rankings showed that Wyandotte County, which includes Kansas City, was the least healthy of 105 counties in the state. The study looked at multiple factors that affect health, including behaviors like smoking, factors in the environment like clean air, access to care, and socio-economic factors like poverty.
How are Communities Using Rankings Data to Improve Local Health?
Throughout the country, residents and local community leaders are using County Health Rankings data to prioritize and coordinate health improvement efforts. Two projects are now highlighted on our stories page.
How Can Reforming Public Safety and Incarceration Impact Public Health?
How is public safety part of your community’s health? County Health Rankings & Roadmaps program staff welcomed community leaders from 2013 RWJF Culture of Health Prize community, Santa Cruz County, CA to share how they addressed the issues of crime, safety and incarceration to improve community health.
According to representatives from Santa Cruz...
How can the Rankings continue to help local communities improve health for all?
As many of you know, the County Health Rankings & Roadmaps program (CHR&R) can be a go-to source for local communities in raising awareness of the broad range of factors that matter to our health and driving change in these areas. But what you may not realize is that each year, state by state, the Rankings also draw attention to the meaningful gaps from the best to...
How Can We Lift Up the Connection Between Housing and Health?
While living in Pittsburgh in the 1960s, Dorothy Richardson recognized the impact housing and community development have on health. Richardson, a Black homemaker, lived in a neighborhood experiencing disinvestment and decline, at least partially due to policies like redlining. At the time, many cities like Pittsburgh thought urban renewal—or the complete demolishing of neighborhoods like...
How Communities Are Creating a Culture of Health and Advancing Equity
Since 2013, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Culture of Health Prize has honored and elevated U.S. communities working at the forefront of advancing health, opportunity, and equity for all. Representing diverse places—from Allen County, Kansas to...
How community development organizations improve well-being in under-invested communities
By Sarah Norman and Alina Schnake-Mahl, NeighborWorks America
The great majority of America’s high-performing community development organizations (CDOs) are actively tackling health challenges in their communities. In a peer-reviewed paper published by the...
How Do You Ensure Everyone in Your Community is Counted in the 2020 Census?
Starting next month, homes across the country will start receiving invitations to complete the 2020 census and it’s vital that everyone is counted.
How Does Civic Participation Influence Health?
Evidence shows the more you get involved, the better your health.