The CHIA Learning Programme 1
This is a peer-to-peer co-learning programme for urban(isation) focused community groups to develop community-led Health Impact Assessments. This is a programme for people and organisations who want to address the ecological systemic factors that influence our health at the local policy level, and seek lasting change to the places where they live.
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Institutionalised framings attribute the worsening health of the population to our individual behaviours and lifestyles. This approach ignores the harmful impact of the many environmental and psychological stressors we’re exposed to. Such stressors include air pollution, job insecurity, and poor social infrastructure; all of which put stress on our biological systems and render us more susceptible to immune, metabolic and hormonal issues.
Given the importance of our environment on our health, you’d expect that the billions of pounds being spent on urban regeneration would have a positive impact on health outcomes. However, this is not the case.
Our experiences and research highlight that the methods for assessing the health and well-being benefits of urban transformations are flawed and require a fundamental overhaul. Further, this should be led by the communities that the policies impact.
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Amongst the messy planning policy system is what’s called a Health Impact Assessment (HIA). It’s advised by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as a practical approach used to judge the potential health effects of a policy, programme or project on a population, particularly on vulnerable or disadvantaged groups. This concept is integral to the UK planning system, to the extent that the NHS London Health Urban Development Unit recommends the integration of a 'community-led HIA' into a Neighborhood Plan.
We have identified that targeting this piece of policy practice is a key opportunity to radically change the conversations and dynamics in which health is impacted. It is based on asking a simple question: is a project or policy increasing or decreasing a community’s exposure to environmental and psychosocial stressors as a result of their interventions?
The practical opportunity is to design a culturally and community appropriate baselining health assessment. This would then be used to navigate conversations between authorities, changemakers (typically real estate developers) and communities focused on mitigating and addressing the various determinants of health often overlooked in the current planning process.
Central and regional government guidance directs the importance and role of community engagement in the planning system. Instead of waiting to be asked to engage, take the solution to the table and show how things should be done.
Learning Outcome 1
We will be learning the link between Health Impact Assessment and environmental/health justice.
Learning Outcome 2
We will be learning how to use Health Impact Assessments as a tool for community led planning, so neighbourhoods begin to reflect community imaginations/visions.
Learning Outcome 3
We will be learning how to link HIA to improving community health
FAQ’s
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This is a peer-to-peer learning and doing programme focused on supporting place-based community organisations exploring and delivering a community-led Health Impact Assessment fit for their area.
This programme supports those that want to embed the intended WHO values which are as follows:
Democracy (promoting stakeholder participation);
Equity (considering the impact on the whole population);
Sustainable development;
The ethical use of evidence.
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From NGO to local government policy guidance a Health Impact Assessment is recommended to safeguard the health and wellbeing of people, identify risks as well as positive impacts available when a new policy or change is being considered. Principally, a Health Impact Assessment is something performed by an organisation evaluating the impacts of their changes. This could be a policy, such as a transition to net-zero, or a physical change, such as the redevelopment of a large urban brownfield site. The factors in the HIA are considered and debated in context to whether something is approved or not, or at least how to manage the process. However, the current methods in how this is performed does not uphold the guided values from the World Health Organisation, principally the level of democratic stakeholder participation. Therefore, by designing what this assessment looks like in practice it is a way to have more impactful, transparent, and democratic conversations with stakeholders.
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This programme is an opportunity to engage with peers, be inspired by domain experts, and be funded to deliver a community-led HIA. This programme is for those who feel that the correct practices are not in place and have a vision for making a lasting difference in their local area - a neighbourhood, district or even local authority region. Over the programme you will be inspired by guest speakers on a range of topics, co-learn from your peers, and work towards creating a layer of practice that has the potential to seamlessly fit into existing policy guidance.
Each participant will receive a stipend payment of £500 to honour their knowledges, and will subsequently be invited to apply for up to £2,000 to cover costs to use the Community Health Impact Assessment Toolkit directly with their own community groups and members should they wish to.
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The programme is led by Centric Lab and Clean Air for Southall & Hayes.
Centric Lab are prototyping ways to use health-based scientific evidence to support justice movements. Using neuroscience and environmental data to identify how biological inequity contributes to poor health outcomes in neighbourhoods and peoples that have been racialised and marginalised, they use this research to build open-access community tools, create new narratives and framings of health, and provide organisations with expertise and insights on health and place.
Clean Air for Southall & Hayes (CASH) are a grassroots community group from west London fighting for their rights to clean air and challenging the role that urban planning and governance structures play. They came together under the belief the air in their streets, homes and schools is being poisoned by the redevelopment of the Old Southall Gasworks, where the soil has been found to contain benzene, a carcinogen, and other harmful chemicals. Since the Berkeley Group began work on the site in Southall, they’ve had to live with a suffocating petrol-like odour and many people have reported breathing difficulties, chest pains, cancer and other symptoms consistent with chronic exposure to benzene.
Together we are long term collaborators with a history going back to 2018. We were awarded a feasibility grant by the Community Knowledge Fund in late 2022 to explore what designing a Health Impact Assessment from the community out looks like. In September 2023 we were awarded further funding to expand the process to other groups across the UK under the vision of “supporting ideas that use the knowledge in communities to address challenges that matter locally”, with the aim of allowing community groups “to play a stronger role in research and innovation” and “help develop and test new ideas and approaches to creating, sharing and using the knowledge held within communities to make progress on local and national challenges.” We’ve combined these resources with those from Impact on Urban Health to run a programme in 2024.
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The programme is designed for people who are part of place based organisations concerned with the stewardship of their local area. For example, we expect to welcome people from Tenant’s Residents Associations, Community Land Trusts, Neighbourhood Forums. As such it is likely that people joining will hold a deep knowledge of local government and urban development policy, politics and practice. We believe that this shared knowledge base will make for a powerful and focused co-learning experience. We expect to welcome a group of 10 participants on behalf of their community organisations from around the UK.
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The programme will be conducted remotely and is likely to run over a number of months. Subject to feedback from applicants we would all meet once in the evening’s per week or fortnightly for 8 sessions via Google Meet (which is free to join and requires no downloads). During this period there will be regular catch-ups, support sessions and “office hours”. There will also be support and guidance from stakeholders such as people from local authorities, health departments, and urban development.
We are aiming to start on Weds 24th Jan with the following schedule:
Session 1 - Welcome session
Session 2 - Exploring democracy and urban development
Session 3 - Equity, susceptibility and understanding different scales of impact
Session 4 - Ethical use of data
Session 5 - Sustainable Development
Session 6 - Solidarity, Kinship and Communality
Session 7 - Engaging with “the system”
Session 8 - How to use the Toolkit
Please note, to receive the second phase funding grant participants will need to attend at least 6 of the 8 sessions and with their best intentions contribute meaningfully to the sessions.
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The end result will be a scientifically and practically informed community led HIA. This document and methodology can be integrated into Neighbourhood Plans or recommended to local authorities and development related stakeholders to be used in Local Plans and/or Supplementary Development Guidance.
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We will run this programme with high safeguarding standards, ensuring that everyone feels comfortable to participate and contribute, free from intimidation, abuse, or neglect. If you join the programme a full welcome pack will cover the programme practice guidelines and ways of working together. This is in place to ensure that as we work together as people for the first time we are all benefiting from each other’s wisdoms, kindness, and intelligence. This programme is co-learning and collaborative, throughout we will welcome discussions about what we can offer throughout.
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Use the online form at the bottom of this page. If you need any assistance please contact us via chiat@thecentriclab.com and will arrange a time to speak. The deadline for applications is 6pm Monday 8th January.
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Despite many overtures of ‘community engagement’ the UK falls behind similar societies such as the USA and Canada in the collaborative design of health impact assessment work. This programme offers the chance to be a foundational step in community-led knowledge shaping local government policy, rather than merely responding to it!
We believe that community participation in HIA links up to the value system of a democratic and egalitarian society. Moreover, it has the potential, in addition to its other goals, to contribute to health promotion. Community participation in HIA contributes to policies that, building on local knowledge, and engaging target groups, address issues that are important, for these groups - in ways that are locally acceptable and appropriate.
— Lea den Broeder et al, Community participation in Health Impact Assessment. A scoping review of the literature (2017)