Vermilion County Community Health Collaborative

Carle Health has new services in Vermilion County to help improve the community’s health outcomes and reduce known disparities. These new initiatives support the Vermilion County Community Health Collaborative and are funded by a grant from the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services.

Through this joint effort, we meet community members where they are and provide access to high-quality healthcare to help improve treatment and outcomes for chronic conditions, as well as to provide preventive and specialty care for each person’s holistic needs.

Carle Health services include:

Community Health Workers – promote good health and help prevent illnesses and disease by connecting individuals to vital healthcare services, community organizations and agencies in Vermilion County. To learn more, visit here.

Healthy Beginnings – a long-term nurse home-visiting service, provided free of charge, for at-risk pregnant women and their families. To learn more, visit here.

Mobile Health Clinic – full-service, high-quality medical care for the entire family that comes right into various neighborhoods within the community. Currently available in Danville the first Friday of every month. To learn more, visit here.

Mobile Market – access to fresh and nutritious foods, as well as some common household goods, for individuals and families around our community. To learn more, visit here.

Mobile Behavioral Health – unit provides harm reduction and treatment resources with a focus on reducing stigma, and decreasing lives impacted by substance misuse in Vermilion County. Recovery is for Everyone. To learn more, visit here.

Community Garden at Carle at The Riverfront – The Vermilion County Community Health Collaborative was funded by the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services (HFS) for a series of organizations and projects throughout Vermilion County to improve the social drivers of health. One of these key drivers is access to fresh food.

Deciding not to just provide fresh food but also to teach gardening, the collaborative used a lot donated by Carle Health to establish a garden with funds from the Hegeler Foundation, Illinois HFS, Christie Clinic and others. Danville Area Community College students designed the garden and those in the Carpentry Education division built the garden boxes.

Elementary, middle and high school students in Project Success of Vermilion County have tended the garden, with University of Illinois Extension providing education and oversight for the planting.

To date, this multiagency project has taught local at-risk students about gardening, and it’ll next evolve into providing education about cooking and preserving healthy foods.

The garden is currently thriving, growing large numbers of tomatoes, zucchini, peppers, squash, cantaloupe and watermelon. Eggplants, okra and other garden plants are also flourishing. Cherry, plum, pear, apple and peach trees – most of which are already bearing fruit in the first year – bring shade and extra beauty.

Best of all: The garden and its high-impact educational and nutritional programs are slated to expand over time, helping more and more people across our community.   

Along with Carle Health – including Carle Hoopeston Regional Health Center – community partners in the collaborative are:

Crosspoint Human Services – funded to hire additional mental health providers and school counselors.
Bowman Street Holdings LLC
DBA Heavenly Square Grocery – funded for the store startup costs, contractors and staff.
New Life Church of Faith
Step Up
Danville Area Community College – funded to develop an associate’s degree in Mental Health and to have students develop landscaping plans for the Community Garden.
Vermilion Advantage
Danville School District 118 – a partner in conducting healthcare career fairs for high school students.
CRIS Healthy Aging
Vermilion County Health Department
East Central Illinois Community Action Agency
City of Danville
CRIS Rural Mass Transit District – funded to help provide transportation for various initiatives. Currently they transport students (from Project Success of Vermilion County) to the Community Garden and back.