NORTH COUNTY: Health Services Project Receives $175,000 Grant
The Wellness Center, a North County project "designed to provide preventive health care and social services" to the area's needy, is a step closer to reality thanks to two grants from philanthropic organizations. The San Diego Union-Tribune reports that the Weingart Foundation, a Los Angeles-based organization with activities in Southern California, donated $150,000, while the Samuel and Katherine Weaver French Fund gave $25,000. The $175,000 will go toward the center's $1.4 million fund raising goal. The campaign for the center has received "$330,000 since last May," and hopes to raise an additional "$150,000 by June to qualify for a grant from a national foundation." Construction on the 18,000-square-foot center, which "is a collaborative project of the Escondido Community Health Center, the North County Interfaith Council and Palomar Family Counseling Service Inc.," is slated to begin next January. The center will offer services including "well-child exams, immunization clinics, nutrition education, counseling, domestic violence support groups and child abuse prevention." According to county officials, "the center will be the first of its kind in the county, ... offering services to meet the physical, mental and emotional needs of those who have limited or no access to health care." Hannah Cohen, the center's development and program director, said, "There is no other facility in the North County that provides wellness care. This will be ... a model program that other communities will be able to follow" (Huard, 3/7).
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