Impact Behavioral Health Partners on Saturday, Oct. 16 will host a “Stride into Skokie 5K” event to celebrate the expansion of Impact’s residential housing portfolio into Skokie.

The event, sponsored by Equinix and NorthShore University Health System, will consist of a 5K walk with a celebration, speakers, and refreshments at the endpoint. The walk will begin at 9 a.m. at the south end of Harbert Payne Park in Evanston, just east of the North Shore Channel on the border with Evanston, and finish at the Skokie Heritage Museum, next to the site of the new build near downtown Skokie.

Speakers will include Skokie Trustee Edie Sue Sutker and Skokie Hospital President David Rahija. Some 130 walkers have registered to walk.

After over 30 years with Impact’s housing portfolio contained within the City of Evanston, the Stride into Skokie walk is a symbolic journey to Skokie, with Impact’s construction of a new 16-unit building near downtown Skokie and the purchase of an additional six-unit apartment building close by. The launch of the construction project is the culmination of several years of collaboration between Equinix and Impact.

“This project would not have been possible without our partnership with Equinix,” says Patti Capouch, Impact’s Executive Director. “The people at Equinix donated their time and resources toward many facets of the project, from site acquisition to direct funding.”

Currently, Impact serves more than 300 individuals with mental illness each year through its Housing, Clinical and Employment services throughout Chicago and its northern suburbs, with a steady increase in the number of participants served every year. All of Impact’s participants are low-income and the majority struggle with homelessness and housing insecurity. The new apartment building will address a critical need in the community for affordable, long-term housing for a vulnerable population.