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Rewriting the Chelsea COVID Story

La Colaborativa
November 3, 2021
Community members in front of Vaccine Van
PHOTO BY NATHAN KLIMA FOR THE BOSTON GLOBE
PHOTO BY NATHAN KLIMA FOR THE BOSTON GLOBE

This time last year, Chelsea was making national headlines as a COVID-19 “hotspot” with the virus spreading ferociously through our city and leaving no family untouched.

Now, Chelsea is again making front page news as a model for community health distribution through local leadership, grassroots outreach, and community participation. Our city, which once had a COVID transmission rate six times the statewide average, now has one of the state’s leading vaccination rates. Our community united to stop the spread of the virus and build a foundation for pandemic recovery.

At La Colaborativa, we put our members to work, hired them as promotores de salud, and sent them door-to-door, neighbor-to neighbor, to have the important conversations about protecting our families through vaccines. None of it would have worked if it hadn’t been for the relationships and trust we had already built with our community in 30 years of empowerment initiatives.

This achievement truly took a village, with La Colaborativa joining forces with countless partners, doctors, civic leaders, and elected officials. There was Mass General Brigham, which deployed doctors and nurses into our neighborhoods to talk with residents about vaccine safety and offer mobile vaccine clinics. There was East Boston Neighborhood Health Center, which set up Chelsea’s first community based vaccination clinic at our Broadway headquarters in February, got the vaccines direct from the feds, and got some of the first shots into Chelsea arms. The City of Chelsea, Green Roots, the Black Alliance and many others were all there with us on the streets, in our neighborhoods, and on social media urging people to protect themselves and their families.

Whether its vaccines, food, housing, jobs, or healthcare, La Colaborativa and our partners are ready and will do whatever it takes to stop the suffering caused by the pandemic. Your donations will help us continue rewriting the Chelsea pandemic story.

PHOTO BY DARLENE DEVITA @peopleofchelsea

“Those women knew what their community needed…They understood what COVID was doing and they loudly insisted that the state not look away. They loudly insisted that Massachusetts General Hospital not look away.”

DR. REGINA LAROCQUE

Infectious Diseases Specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital

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Land Acknowledgment

At La Colaborativa, we believe that building a more just, equitable, and healthy future begins with recognizing the histories of the land and the communities that came before us, while confronting the systemic inequities that continue to shape our society today.

We acknowledge that La Colaborativa is located in Winnisimmet, now known as Chelsea, Massachusetts, on the ancestral and unceded homeland of the Massachusett People, whose deep connections to this land, culture, and community endure today.

We honor the Indigenous peoples who have stewarded this land for generations and recognize the lasting consequences of colonization, forced displacement, dispossession, and systemic injustice. These histories are not simply part of the past. Their legacies continue to influence access to land, housing, healthcare, education, economic opportunity, and the resources that allow individuals, families, and communities to thrive.

At La Colaborativa, we understand that health equity cannot be achieved without addressing the social determinants of health, the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work, and age.

Structural racism, poverty, housing instability, food insecurity, and barriers to education, employment, and healthcare disproportionately affect immigrant, Indigenous, and historically marginalized communities, perpetuating cycles of inequality across generations.

This understanding is at the heart of La Colaborativa's holistic, community-driven model. Our work recognizes that the challenges facing our communities are deeply interconnected and cannot be addressed in isolation. By integrating housing stability, food access, healthcare, workforce development, education, economic mobility, and community advocacy, we work to address the root causes of inequity, strengthen community resilience, and create pathways toward lasting social and economic opportunity.

Rooted in our mission of Levantando al Pueblo, we believe that meaningful change begins by centering the voices, experiences, cultural identities, and leadership of the communities most affected by systemic injustice. Just as we honor the resilience and enduring presence of Indigenous peoples, we recognize the strength of immigrant families and historically marginalized communities who continue to shape our collective future.

For us, a land acknowledgment is more than a statement of respect. It is a reminder of our responsibility to turn recognition into meaningful action, challenge the systems that perpetuate inequality, and advance a model of community well-being grounded in dignity, belonging, self-determination, and justice.

We offer this acknowledgment with respect and gratitude to the Massachusett People, their ancestors, elders, and present-day communities, and with a continued commitment to learning, solidarity, and building a future where every community has the resources, opportunities, and power to thrive.