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October 20, 2017

Fifty Years and Counting

On October 18, 2018 Mission Neighborhood Health Center celebrated its 50^th anniversary with the community, its employees, its Board and its supporters with a festive party at the Gray Area Grand Theater in San Francisco’s Mission District.  The theme of the night was “Healing with Love/Bienestar con Amor”.  The celebration included musical entertainment, visits from Supervisor Ronen and Supervisor Safai, delicious food and dancing!

The anniversary marks a half-century legacy of providing health care with a heart.  Mission Neighborhood Health Center (MNHC) was founded as a health center in the late 1960’s to respond to the healthcare needs of low-income families in the Mission neighborhood in San Francisco and has grown to become an integral part of the community. From the humble beginnings of delivering care in a trailer in the parking lot at our Shotwell Street site for $1 per visit, each year, MNHC serves nearly 13,000 patients at its three sites in the Mission and Excelsior neighborhoods of San Francisco.

MNHCs roots were inspired by Jack Geiger, a young doctor and civil rights activist who while studying in South Africa witnessed how a unique community-based health care model brought great health improvements for the poorest citizens of that country and brought the model to the United States in 1965. Mission District advocates established Mission Neighborhood Health Center based on the same model and out of a movement that envisioned access to health care across the nation as a social justice imperative.  The health center movement grew alongside other important movements and social justice accomplishments in the mid to late 1960’s including the civil rights act which banned discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex or national origin in employment and public accommodations; the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which restored voting rights for minorities, the Fair Housing Act of 1968 which banned discrimination in the sale or rental of housing; the farmworker’s movement which resulted in the first contracts for farm workers in California, the women’s movement; the gay rights movement and the environmental movement among others.

Fifty years later, MNHC is proud to celebrate its accomplishments and those of our predecessors and are again called to stand up for social justice in movements such as Black Lives Matter, the MeToo Movement, the defense of the Affordable Care Act and the movement for universal health care coverage.  Over the years, we have consistently stood in solidarity with our immigrant communities and now still as children are separated from their families, promises to our young immigrant dreamers are taken away and protective status for many Central Americans is threatened. Mission Neighborhood Health Center has and will always be the medical home and a respite to our Latino immigrant community and to all who walk in our doors.  We aim to provide healing with love and a medical home to all.

As we look to the future, we envision universal access to health care, where no one worries about pre-existing conditions or being able to afford medications.  We see individuals and communities in stable permanent housing, living in safe and culturally vibrant neighborhoods. We see clean air and water, access to healthy foods, social and economic opportunities for all, quality accessible education, and interactive and relationship building social environments -all conducive to health.  And, we envision Mission Neighborhood Health Center continuing to provide immunizations and screening tests, continuing to bring babies into the world, taking care of our beloved patients when they are sick all while delivering healing with love – Bienestar con Amor.

We are excited about the next 50 years and how we can continue to support the community “with heart” in this ever-changing world.

Every Donation Helps We would be honored if you would contribute to our next 50 years of helping the community. Every donation helps to further our programs and provide much needed services and care.  It’s easy to make a year-end donation by clicking here. We thank you con Amor – with heart.

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