In Acres Homes, 46% of residents are classified as obese, 18% have diabetes, 42.5% suffer from high blood pressure, 20% wrestle with poor mental health and 12% live with asthma.
To say Acres Homes is in need of a serious healthcare upgrade is an understatement.
Enter Legacy Community Health, which recently broke ground on a new, state-of-the-art clinic – the Legacy Acres Homes Clinic (LAHC) – in the historically Black and Latino neighborhood in north Houston that has long faced severe healthcare access gaps.
“We are so fortunate to be able to partner with Houston Methodist. They have granted us $51 million in order to be able to go into two areas (Pasadena and Acres Homes) where there isn’t the access to healthcare that we would expect or like to see in a city such as ours, the fourth largest city in the United States,” said the Chief Medical Officer of Acres Homes’ new clinic, Dr. Tamisha Jones.
Legacy Community Health is the largest Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) in Texas. Legacy and Houston Methodist have had a long-standing relationship for over 25 years. The $51 million gift from Houston Methodist is the largest donation Legacy has received in its history and helps the two organizations come together to fill a significant gap in the Pasadena and Acres Homes communities.
Houston Methodist is just as excited about partnering with Legacy, according to Cathy Easter, senior vice president of community development at Houston Methodist.
“The Acres Homes clinic is part of a more than 30-year commitment we’ve made to address the health care needs of our community,” said Easter. “We are proud to expand our partnership with Legacy Community Health in Acres Homes. We look forward to deepening ties in this historic and vital community and providing access to quality health care in service of the community.”
Acres Homes is 48% African American and 42% Hispanic. One quarter of Acres Homes’ residents are uninsured, and one in five residents live below the poverty line.
Many Acres Homes residents, including Rosie Powell, believe their community has been ignored in multiple ways.
Powell recently spoke about Governor Greg Abbott’s delayed announcement regarding the date to elect District 18’s U.S. Representative. She connected this community “diss” to Acres Homes’ need for better healthcare.
“Our seat in Congress is empty, and every day that goes by without a representative, decisions are being made about our healthcare, our social security and our lives with no one there to speak for us,” Powell said.
The community’s fighter in Austin, State Rep. Charlene Johnson, has better health realities for her constituents on her wish list.
“We definitely need to regulate having quality air,” said Johnson. “We want to make sure that people know that our health is just as important. We want to have a quality of life no matter where your zip code is.”
Acres Homes’ new 26,000 square foot clinic, which will open in the summer of 2026, will be equipped to address a wide range of health issues.
The LAHC will offer access to affordable health care and services, including a full range of adult medicine, pediatrics, behavioral health, pharmacy, OB/GYN, infusion therapy, wraparound services, eligibility services and pharmacy. The clinic will offer four infusion bays as part of its infusion pharmacy services, bringing critically needed oncology care to the community.
The facility will cine equipped with 24 state-of-the-art examination rooms, including 12 for pediatrics, 12 for adults and OB/GYN and two for behavioral health.
“It’s gonna be a game changer… We have traditionally done such an amazing job wherever we put our clinics to make sure that it fits in and is aligned with the footprint of the community,” said Jones, referring to artwork and other measures to make sure Legacy’s clinics reflect the communities in which they reside.
“That’s exactly what we plan to do in Acres Home, to be able to engage the community around the physical space so that it really does feel like home when you walk in,” said Jones. “It’s meant to be a medical home. It’s meant to feel like a place that the Acres Homes community can be proud of and feel comfortable in and know that, ‘Hey, this is my medical home.’”
