The Framework for Mental Health Equity - created in partnership with the Mayor's Office, the Chicago Department of Public Health and numerous leading local mental health and community organizations that serve Chicago’s most vulnerable residents - is the right plan for Chicago. This plan will build equity and transform mental healthcare by investing in and supporting a comprehensive system of care that prioritizes the people and communities most in need. 

We are doubling our investment in mental healthcare to support 20 public and nonprofit health centers, including current city-run clinics, that will serve high-need neighborhoods and provide care regardless of patients’ ability to pay or insurance status. The plan also enhances violence prevention programming to address mental health needs, focusing on the residents and communities most impacted by violence and poverty; funds crisis prevention and response programs for people with health challenges that make it difficult to access brick-and-mortar clinics; and coordinates the system of care by ensuring that everyone in Chicago who needs mental healthcare knows how to access services. A citywide network of care will ensure all Chicagoans have access to the mental health services they need, when and where they need them.

The following partner organizations have endorsed Mayor Lightfoot’s Framework for Mental Health Equity:

• Access Community Health Network
• Anixter Center
• Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago
• BBF Family Services (Better Boys Foundation)
• Bobby Wright Comprehensive Behavioral Health Center
• Bright Star Community Outreach
• Board of Health President Dr. Carolyn Lopez
• Community Counseling Centers of Chicago (C4)
• Erie Family Health Centers
• Esperanza Health Centers
• Friend Health
• Habilitative Systems Inc.
• Heartland Alliance
• Heartland Health Centers
• Howard Brown Health
• Human Resources Development Institute (HRDI)
• The Kennedy Forum
• Lawndale Christian Health Center
• Lutheran Social Services of Illinois
• National Alliance on Mental Illness Chicago
• Thresholds
• Trilogy Behavioral Health