Tubman Center 'Turns Soil' on New Rainier Beach Health Center
Last week, the Tubman Center for Health & Freedom held a soil-turning ceremony to celebrate the start of the first phase of construction of the new Tubman Health Center. With construction projected to be completed in 18 months, the 26,000-square-foot facility located in Seattle’s Rainier Beach neighborhood will serve 12,000 primary care patients annually with a new model that aims to empower people to be an integral part of their own healthcare.
Monisha Harrell, Lynnwood’s assistant city administrator and a community ambassador for Tubman Health, emceed the ceremony. (Harrell served as Seattle’s deputy mayor under her uncle Bruce Harrell from 2022 to 2023.)
“Now you've all heard of today being called our soil-turning rather than our groundbreaking, and that is because we're not breaking anything in Rainier Beach,” said Harrell. “A soil-turning says we are here to start this new chapter in relationship with the land, in relationship with one another, in relationship with the neighborhood. Today belongs to all of us.”
The Tubman Center for Health & Freedom was founded in 2020 by six Black, Native, and queer community members who recognized that healthcare as it currently existed wasn’t designed with marginalized people in mind. The founders had a vision for a healthcare model that was instead created for and informed by the community.
https://www.theurbanist.org/tubman-center-turns-soil-on-new-rainier-beach-health-center/