Goal: Personal and environmental health creates conditions where people can retain and enhance assets.

Strategy: Expand community advocacy to increase health services for selected issues. These issues include substance abuse, mental health treatment, and health care access for people in or vulnerable to conditions of poverty. These issues were identified by community members as particularly important to transforming the lives of people in conditions of poverty, or to keep people from experiencing poverty who are vulnerable to entering conditions of poverty.

Current Focus: Support for Mom's Off Meth and Dad's Against Drugs, an informal community-based support for recovery from addiction.  They are gender-specific groups that provide a safe, empowering and healing space.  It is specially helpful for parents who have expereinced child welfare involvement due to their substance use.  We are working to expand the region in which these support groups are located, so we may reach out to the rural community.   

Intended Outcomes:
Increase substance abuse and mental health services. Increase substance abuse and mental health service for people in and vulnerable to conditions of poverty.
Leverage action on key health issues where opportunities exist. Take action on key issues where there is an opportunity to leverage change, that increases health services for people who are in conditions of poverty (or very vulnerable to conditions of poverty).
Increase health services for people in vulnerable conditions. Increase regional capacity for meeting the health needs of people who are part of vulnerable populations. (Elderly, people with disabilities, people in rural areas, people who are isolated, new Iowans, and uninsured and underinsured families).

Key Indicator: Increased community preparedness and capacity for the increasing health needs of people who are part of vulnerable populations.

Connection to Assets: Focusing on this area helps primarily build human assets, which in turn protects social, financial and physical assets. It also addresses conditions of the natural environment that can affect human assets.

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