The Hudson Guild is a community-based social services organization rooted in and primarily focused on the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It was founded in 1897 by Dr. John Lovejoy Elliott as a settlement house, with the intention of helping to alleviate the problems of the immigrant community of Chelsea's industrial area. The Guild continues to provide a variety of programs and services, including after-school care, professional counselling and community arts programs to the neighborhood. [1]
In 1895, John Lovejoy Elliott, a young man greatly influenced by the growing settlement house and Ethical Culture movements, planted the seed for what became the Hudson Guild, organizing the "Hurly Burlies," a social and recreation club for young men in the Chelsea neighborhood. In the next few years, Elliott established numerous clubs and programs for other groups, including young boys and girls, working women, and families. Elliott's disparate programs merged in 1897 to become the Hudson Guild, which provided a platform to organize residents to improve neighborhood living conditions. Elliott’s son-in-law, H. Daniel Carpenter, followed him as head of Hudson Guild. Carpenter was executive director during a crucial period, from 1943 until 1973 and introduced or expanded programs for returning veterans, low and middle income housing, job training, and early childhood education. [2]
Among the Guild's early advocacy successes were lobbying for the New York State Tenement House Act in 1901, the creation of Chelsea Park, the first recreational space in the area in 1907, and the approval of new, low-cost, city-funded housing in Chelsea in 1938. At the same time, the Guild offered a broad range of direct programming and services to Chelsea residents, opening the first free kindergarten in New York City in 1897, starting the first Summer Play School in the city in 1917, opening dental, prenatal, and well-baby clinics in 1919-1921, founding the Elliott Neighbors Club for Senior Citizens in 1947, opening one of the city’s first community mental health clinics in 1948, and the first offerings of English-as-a-Second-Language classes in 1950.
In 1966 the Guild advocated for anti-poverty programs, including Neighborhood Youth Corps, VISTA and Head Start, and worked with other settlement houses and the city to merge Head Start and daycare in 1993. It founded the Chelsea Community-Supported Agriculture co-op in 2000 and in 2005 successfully advocated for affordable housing inclusion in West Chelsea redevelopment plans.
In 2007, the Hudson Guild was among over 530 New York City arts and social service institutions to receive part of a $20 million grant from the Carnegie Corporation, which was made possible through a donation by New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg. [3]
Each year, Hudson Guild provides a service for over 14,000 people. Hudson Guild has five main program areas: Children and Youth Services, Adult Services, Arts Program, Community Building, and Mental Health.
Hudson Guild’s Children and Youth Services targets at-risk youth living in Chelsea and surrounding neighborhoods. Hudson Guild works with other organizations and initiatives, such as non-profit Slideluck Potshow's Slideluck Youth Initiative (SLYI). The Guild’s Arts Program operates a theatre and two galleries. The Guild's Mental Health program provides a range of services to meet the mental health needs of residents of Chelsea and surrounding neighborhoods, including group and individual therapy through a licensed mental health clinic; school-based mental health services to a local elementary school; and programs for at-risk youth.
Hell's Kitchen, also known as Clinton, is a neighborhood on the West Side of Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It is considered to be bordered by 34th Street to the south, 59th Street to the north, Eighth Avenue to the east, and the Hudson River to the west.
Chelsea is a neighborhood on the West Side of the borough of Manhattan in New York City. The area's boundaries are roughly 14th Street to the south, the Hudson River and West Street to the west, and Sixth Avenue to the east, with its northern boundary variously described as near the upper 20s or 34th Street, the next major crosstown street to the north. To the northwest of Chelsea is the neighborhood of Hell's Kitchen, as well as Hudson Yards; to the northeast are the Garment District and the remainder of Midtown South; to the east are NoMad and the Flatiron District; to the southwest is the Meatpacking District; and to the south and southeast are the West Village and the remainder of Greenwich Village. Chelsea is named after the Royal Hospital Chelsea in London, England.
Hunts Point is a neighborhood located on a peninsula in the South Bronx of New York City. It is the location of one of the largest food distribution facilities in the world, the Hunts Point Cooperative Market. Its boundaries are the Bruckner Expressway to the west and north, the Bronx River to the east, and the East River to the south. Hunts Point Avenue is the primary street through Hunts Point.
The Henry Street Settlement is a not-for-profit social service agency in the Lower East Side neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City that provides social services, arts programs and health care services to New Yorkers of all ages. It was founded under the name Nurses' Settlement in 1893 by progressive reformer and nurse Lillian Wald.
A halfway house is an institute for people with criminal backgrounds or substance use disorder problems to learn the necessary skills to re-integrate into society and better support and care for themselves.
A group home, congregate living facility, or care home is a residence model of medical care for those with complex health needs. Traditionally, the model has been used for children or young people who cannot live with their families or afford their own homes, people with chronic disabilities who may be adults or seniors, or people with dementia and related aged illnesses. Typically, there are no more than six residents, and there is at least one trained caregiver there 24 hours a day. In some early "model programs", a house manager, night manager, weekend activity coordinator, and four part-time skill teachers were reported. Originally, the term group home referred to homes of 8 to 16 individuals, which was a state-mandated size during deinstitutionalization. Residential nursing facilities, also included in this article, may be as large in 2015 as 100 individuals, which is no longer the case in fields such as intellectual and developmental disabilities. Depending on the severity of the condition requiring one to need to live in a group home, some clients are able to attend day programs and most clients are able to live normal lifestyles.
Callen-Lorde Community Health Center is a primary care center located at 356 West 18th Street in New York City, New York. Callen-Lorde also provides comprehensive mental health services at The Thea Spyer Center, located at 230 West 17th Street. Callen-Lorde is dedicated to providing medical health care to the city's LGBTQ population without regard to ability to pay. It is named in honor of Michael Callen and Audre Lorde.
Penn South, officially known as Mutual Redevelopment Houses and formerly Penn Station South, is a limited-equity housing cooperative development located between Eighth and Ninth Avenues and West 23rd and 29th Streets, in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. The complex has 2,820 units in ten 22-story buildings. Penn South is so named because of its location southwest of New York Penn Station.
The Tenderloin is a neighborhood in downtown San Francisco, in the flatlands on the southern slope of Nob Hill, situated between the Union Square shopping district to the northeast and the Civic Center office district to the southwest. It encompasses about 50 square blocks, and is a large wedge/triangle in shape. It is historically bounded on the north by Geary Street, on the east by Mason Street, on the south by Market Street and on the west by Van Ness Avenue. The northern boundary with Lower Nob Hill has historically been set at Geary Street. The area has among the highest levels of homelessness and crime in the city.
Lenox Hill Neighborhood House is a multi-service community-based organization that serves people in need on the East Side of Manhattan and on Roosevelt Island. Founded in 1894 as a free kindergarten for the children of indigent immigrants and as one of the first settlement houses in the nation, Lenox Hill Neighborhood House is the oldest and largest provider of social, legal and educational services on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Each year, they assist thousands of individuals and families who range in age from 3 to 103, represent dozens of races, ethnicities and countries of origin and "live, work, go to school or access services" on the East Side from 14th Street to 143rd Street and on Roosevelt Island. Their clients include indigent families and the working poor who live in the East Side's housing projects and tenements or who travel to the Upper East Side to work in low-wage jobs such as cashiers, housekeepers, nannies and laborers; 10,000 seniors; and hundreds of mentally ill homeless and formerly homeless adults. They have five locations between 54th and 102nd Streets, offer programs at dozens of East Side locations; their headquarters is located on East 70th Street.
The University Settlement Society of New York is an American organization which provides educational and social services to immigrants and low-income families, located at 184 Eldridge Street on the Lower East Side of the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York. It provides numerous services for the mostly immigrant population of the neighborhood and has since 1886, when it was established as the first settlement house in the United States.
Hamilton-Madison House is a voluntary, non-profit settlement house dedicated to improving the quality of life of its community, primarily that of the Two Bridges/Chinatown area of the Lower East Side of Manhattan, New York City, United States. The neighborhood is a federally designated poverty area, with a constantly changing mixture of ethnic groups, and lack of adequate services and resources. An average income of a family living in the area is $17,000. Further, more than 25% of the seniors live on less than $15,000 a year, of which 40% goes toward housing. In the past 108 years, Hamilton-Madison House has developed programs that meet the changing needs of its community. In 1965, with a change in federal immigration policies, the community's predominant immigrant became Chinese New Yorkers. Since that time, the organization's staff has grown to include a staff of 300 who collectively speak 15 languages, including 6 Chinese dialects. Further, the House's long-standing programs have been adapted to meet the cultural norms of this expanding population.
Union Settlement is one of the oldest settlement houses in New York City, providing community-based services and programs that support the immigrant and low-income residents of East Harlem since 1895. It is East Harlem’s largest social service agency and serves 10,000 people annually through programs including early childhood education, youth services, senior services, adult education, mental health, small business development and community outreach.
The Chelsea-Elliott Houses is a combined housing project of the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), located between West 25th and 27th Streets and Ninth and Tenth Avenues in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It consists of two contiguous projects which were originally separate but have been combined for administrative purposes: the John Lovejoy Elliott Houses, named after the founder of the Hudson Guild, has four 11- and 12-story buildings which accommodate over 1400 residents in 589 apartments. The Chelsea Houses has over 1,000 residents in 426 apartments within two 21-story buildings.
The Downtown Community House at 105-107 Washington Street is a six-story, five-bay red brick building that is among the last vestiges of the Lower West Side of Manhattan's former life as an ethnic neighborhood known as “Little Syria.” From the time of its establishment, the Bowling Green Neighborhood Association, housed in the Downtown Community House beginning in 1926, was a pioneering organization that served the local immigrant population as a settlement house and continued to provide services for the area well after the community house became defunct. Built in 1925 with philanthropic funds from William H. Childs, the founder of the Bon Ami household cleaner company, the Downtown Community House was designed by John F. Jackson, architect of over 70 Y.M.C.A. buildings and community centers, and through its Colonial Revival style speaks to an underlying desire for the neighborhood's immigrant population to become Americanized and associate themselves with the country's foundations. In recent years, a collection of historic preservationists and Arab-American activists have lobbied the Landmarks Preservation Commission and its chairman Robert Tierney to designate the building as a city landmark.
The San Francisco Bay Area comprises nine northern California counties and contains four of the ten most expensive counties in the United States. Strong economic growth has created hundreds of thousands of new jobs, but coupled with severe restrictions on building new housing units, it has resulted in an extreme housing shortage which has driven rents to extremely high levels. The Sacramento Bee notes that large cities like San Francisco and Los Angeles both attribute their recent increases in homeless people to the housing shortage, with the result that homelessness in California overall has increased by 15% from 2015 to 2017. In September 2019, the Council of Economic Advisers released a report in which they stated that deregulation of the housing markets would reduce homelessness in some of the most constrained markets by estimates of 54% in San Francisco, 40 percent in Los Angeles, and 38 percent in San Diego, because rents would fall by 55 percent, 41 percent, and 39 percent respectively. In San Francisco, a minimum wage worker would have to work approximately 4.7 full-time jobs to be able to spend less than 30% of their income on renting a two-bedroom apartment.
Erie Neighborhood House is a social service agency that works primarily with low-income, immigrant families in Chicago, Illinois. Operations began in 1870 as a ministry of Holland Presbyterian Church, a Protestant congregation located northwest of Chicago's Loop, and the organization quickly became part of the settlement house movement that emerged in the late 19th century. It currently offers programs and services from four locations—two in Chicago's West Town community area, a third in Little Village, and fourth at Jose De Diego Elementary School in East Humboldt Park—to a population characterized as predominantly Latino.
The United South End Settlements (USES) consist of four settlement houses, founded as part of the Settlement movement to provide services such as daycare, education, and healthcare to improve the lives of the poor, and a children's museum dating back to 1891. With their slogan of "neighbors helping neighbors since 1891", the United South End Settlements continues to serve Boston's South End and Lower Roxbury community today. USES has grown and evolved over time to remain relevant to the South End.
Weinland Park is a neighborhood north of downtown Columbus, Ohio and encompassed by the boundaries of the University District. A development boom in the 1930s and 1940s resulting from new streetcar lines and the blossoming of factories brought working and middle-class families to the neighborhood. Current housing stock consists primarily of single family residential buildings that have been converted to rentals or multifamily housing. Row-homes and apartment buildings are also ubiquitous in the neighborhood. Renters currently outnumber owners. Commercial and entertainment facilities are concentrated on the North High Street corridor, but also pocket the inner part of the neighborhood as well. Weinland Park saw the sapping of its population and wealth with the rise of newer suburbs ringing the outer reaches of the city and the collapse of local industry and streetcar lines. The neighborhood has been plagued with crime and drug problems for decades but has recently seen a flood of new investment that has brought growth and revitalization to this long struggling neighborhood. Investment into the community includes the South Campus Gateway providing retail and residential finished in 2005, and a new food district and employment center.
Greenwich House is a West Village settlement house in New York City.
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