We are the community-created Urban Ecology Wellness Center at Keney Park, leveraging 693 acres of urban forest in Hartford’s Northeast Neighborhood. We serve as an asset to meet residents’ health and wellness needs while providing stewardship for the conservation of this magnificent greenspace.
The focus of our approach is collaborative. We aim to work with the partners, resources, and residents to assist identify the necessary measures to offset some of the city’s deepest health and wellness challenges while providing environmental education and conservation activities. We see things through a holistic lens; regarding nutrition, nature, education, spirituality, and our built and emotional environments as the drivers of health and wellness of the whole being. By using nature immersion as a healing tool to reduce trauma, our goal is to empower residents to leverage urban ecology and wellness knowledge and practices to their own communities in tandem with traditional health systems.
And, we are not alone. From the Ebony Horsewomen, The Hartford Cricket League, newly renovated golf course, North End Little League, Swift Factory project, and the Friends of Keney Park. The Urban Ecology Wellness Center is happy to become part of an emerging group of entities committed to investing in the physical and natural resources of North Hartford to promote health, wellness, education and environmental stewardship through development.
From Wildlife education to Group Medical Visits to Yoga Classes, the Urban Ecology Wellness Center is geared to provide a one-stop shop for health and wellness services, but also serve as a referral source for our community partners.
Despite numerous outstanding community health initiatives, there is a lack of coordination among and between providers and community-based organizations that limit the effectiveness of the programs and the funding that are going to help serve the populations most in need.
Hartford 400 is an initiative that looks to transform Hartford by aligning past and current efforts across the city into a shared vision. As part of this, they have identified ten transformative development projects, one of which is The Urban Ecology Wellness Center. Visit their website and read the plan to learn more.
