According to Whittier Street Health Center executive director, Frederica Williams, Whittier Street has been looking for a permanent home for the last 30 years.

Now, thanks to a stimulus award, it is finally getting one.

The Whittier Street Health Center has a long history in Boston, starting from 1933 when it opened as a well baby clinic to address health issues within the low income population in the city. Over the years, the Health Center has evolved into a medical and community center that serves its neighborhoods’ needs in every possible way from basic health care to a prison re-entry program to a refugee health assessment site to a geriatric clinic and more. The center recently launched an urgent care clinic and its preventive care programs include an obesity clinic, an asthma clinic and a men’s health clinic

Just eight years ago, the center was serving 5,000 people a year. These days, that number has ballooned to 13,000 and, not surprisingly, space has become increasingly tight. Williams says that the center has tried to make due by expanding its daily hours and opening over the weekend but that has not managed to fully relieve the overcrowding.