The Sankofa Village Wellness Center is preparing to open its doors in April at 4305 W. Madison St. in West Garfield Park. The facility aims to address health disparities and improve life expectancy for residents of Chicago’s West Side, according to officials involved with the project.
The three-story, 60,000-square-foot center will offer a range of services, including primary medical care, reproductive and behavioral health services, dental care, substance abuse treatment, health education programs, screenings, mental health training, workforce development initiatives, fitness classes, youth sports programs, drop-in child care, an indoor gymnasium and a walking track.
Tenants in the building include the Garfield Park Rite to Wellness Collaborative—one of the minority owners—Rush Medical Center, Erie Family Health Centers (the main primary care provider), West Side United (which will operate a job training kiosk), Equal Hope (offering free cancer screenings for uninsured and underinsured patients), and the YMCA of Metropolitan Chicago (providing fitness facilities and child care).
The design features floor-to-ceiling windows in the lobby with a sankofa symbol from Ghana’s Akan people. The lobby also has an extra-wide staircase that doubles as coworking space.
Rebecca Lahey, a mental health manager with Rush who will oversee behavioral health services at Sankofa said: “My hope is that being more embedded on the West Side and really showing that commitment, having providers that reflect the communities that we are serving, can really help us to reduce stigma around mental health specifically but also support folks in engaging in their health care and overall wellness in a meaningful way.”
Kawana Tharps—a family nurse practitioner at Erie who will serve as Sankofa site medical director—noted: “There’s a significant life expectancy gap here and that’s just one of the health disparities that we see in this neighborhood. The hope is that the center can help bridge that gap.”
A 2015 report from Virginia Commonwealth University found West Garfield Park residents have an average life expectancy of 69 years compared to 85 years for those living downtown. A city study published in 2021 reported Black Chicagoans live about nine fewer years than non-Black residents due to higher rates of chronic illnesses and violence.
The Sankofa Village Wellness Center began construction in fall 2024. It is led by Garfield Park Rite to Wellness Collaborative alongside The Community Builders and MAAFA Redemption Project. Last year it won $10 million through the Chicago Prize awarded by the Pritzker Traubert Foundation toward its estimated $48 million total cost.
Other projects under the larger Sankofa Wellness Village umbrella include K Entrepreneurship Hub at 4400 W. Madison St., as well as MAAFA Center for Arts and Activism at 4241 W. Washington Blvd., which broke ground last September.
Tharps emphasized: “Health doesn’t begin in an exam room. It’s the other things that the center as a whole is offering as well: the YMCA, physical activity, nutrition classes, workforce engagement. It’s not just health care, even though clearly as Erie that is our primary concern.”
For more information about programs or services offered by Sankofa Village Wellness Center or related developments within Sankofa Wellness Village visit their website.
