RACP at it again: Mazzoni Center gets $1.5M for purchase, renovation of new building & HQ

The Mazzoni Center received the largest one-time award in its history – $1.5 million that will go toward the purchase and renovation of a building where the organization will relocate and consolidate its offices, programs and services.

The Mazzoni Center — a health care provider specifically targeting the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities — received the funds through the state's Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program, or RCAP.

The $1.5 million will go toward the purchase and renovation of a building at Broad and Bainbridge streets, where the Mazzoni Center will relocate in summer 2017. The overall cost for the purchase and renovation is $14 million.

“With the RACP grant, we have secured over $3.8 million, and we are closing the gap to our goal of $6 million by 2022," Mark Blecher, chair of Mazzoni Center’s Building Committee, said in a statement.

The Mazzoni Center operates out of three Center City locations. The move will solve space shortages the organization has faced at its medical practice at 809 Locust St. and its main offices on 12th Street.

The new space will double the Mazzoni Center's capacity for medical visits and nearly double its counseling and behavioral health spaces, according to the center. It will also enable the organization to set up the region’s first LGBTQ-specific Intensive Outpatient Program for substance abuse.

“The sharp increase in demand for our services, along with a shortage of available and affordable space in our current locations, has brought Mazzoni Center to a transformational moment in our history,” according to Board President Jimmy Ruiz. “Simply put — we need more space, and we need to be under one roof."

The unoccupied two-story building, formerly a Department of Public Welfare office, will be retrofitted, and two stories will be added and configured to Mazzoni’s specifications and needs.

With a total of 45,000 square feet of space, the new building will increase Mazzoni’s overall program space by about 14,000 square feet.

The funding is the largest amount ever awarded by the state to an organization with an LGBTQ-focused mission, according to the Mazzoni Center.

“I’m very pleased to see the commonwealth extending support to this important project, which will have a substantial impact on the health and well being of the many people Mazzoni Center serves, which includes some of the most vulnerable individuals in Philadelphia,” State Rep. Brian Sims said in a statement.

“In addition to what it will do in terms of bricks-and-mortar and the provision of essential services, this award represents an important affirmation of the values of fairness and inclusion, and the idea that all Pennsylvanians deserve equal access to quality healthcare," Sims added.

Founded in 1979 as an all-volunteer clinic serving the city’s LGBT communities, the Mazzoni Center employs 136 people and has more than 30 separate programs and services, including trans-specific health care HIV prevention and education services, and more.

Source: Philadelphia Business Journal