On Tuesday, February 25, 2025, the Watertown City Council unanimously endorsed the recommendations of a year-long health and human services assessment prepared by HMA for the City of Watertown, Massachusetts. The report, released in November 2024, included a qualitative and quantitative assessment of the community’s health and human service needs and recommended resources to fill those gaps. As part of the project, HMA facilitated extensive community outreach and data gathering efforts in 2024 to elicit a range of community perspectives including 20 interviews, 8 focus groups, and 2 community-wide meetings resulting in 9 recommendations for organizational and program efficiencies and enhancements.
Through engagement and analysis, key community priorities emerged with a focus on programs and services relating to housing security, food security, wellness promotion, disability supports, older adult supports, communications and language access, immigrant supports, veterans’ services, public health, physical and behavioral health, and diversity, equity, and inclusion. Health and human services were considered through an intersectional lens, recognizing their overlapping qualities and characteristics that reflect how real people experience their own unique needs and seek support from a multitude of public and private supports.
