About the Center

Chicago South Side Birth Center is a non-profit, independent, Black midwife-led Birth Center located on the South Side of Chicago. 

Our Vision

The Chicago South Side Birth Center will help address inequities in birth outcomes by providing culturally centered midwifery care alongside families and within the community to promote wellness and abundance in whole health.

With only four hospitals on the South Side providing maternity services, the lack of access to care is an emergency. Without proper intervention and care, rates of infant and maternal morbidity will increase and access will continue to be a barrier. It is our goal at the Chicago South Side Birth Center to disrupt these maternal health outcomes for Black birthing people and their families across the city’s South Side.

We aim to offer a low risk option for birth and mixed risk option for reproductive health care for people in their own neighborhood and community. We hope to be an answer to the lack of care options currently available on the Southside as well as a solution to the disparate maternal and child health rates among Black birthing people and children on the South Side. 

Our story

“All that you touch you change…”

It was in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd when Jeanine Valrie Logan and Karie Stewart, two Black midwives, came together to change the landscape of Black maternal Health on Chicago’s south side with a vision to open a birth center. Alongside them and many other and Birth Center activists and legislative sponsors, Jeanine helped write and pass HB738 which expands birth centers in the state of Illinois to areas where the Black maternal and child health outcomes are worse than the county and state–these areas including the South Side, West Side, and East St. Louis. HB738 was signed into law in August 2021.

Jeanine founded Chicago South Side Birth Center in June 2021.

*Earthseed, Parables of the Sower, Octavia Butler

Our Guiding Principles

“Freedom is a place”
Ruth Wilson Gilmore

  • Birth Justice

    We believe birth justice in praxis involves the centering of Black birthing people, Black experiences, and Black healing practices. We see our role in providing culturally relevant access to safe midwifery care as a commitment to the larger birth justice movement and informs our resistance and organizing.

  • Autonomy

    We believe we have the solutions and technology to create our own liberation—specifically our freedom and autonomy regarding birth, parenting, and healing.

  • Liberation

    Chicago South Side Birth Center is not a reactionary response to systemic oppression and white supremacy but as a necessary entity—a literal space—that exists to build community, heal, and liberate. Our icon, the Morning Glory, is a representation (our North Star) of that liberation and freedom.

  • Self-Determination

    As a community, it is imperative we have equal input and buy-in for CSSBC’s programming, services, the how and when we work, as well as creating spaces and opportunities for worker and community innovation and creation of programs and services.

  • Wellness

    We are committed to grow intergenerational wellness across the South Side through our community health education, ongoing community engagement, and learning offerings to those interested in the fields of health, midwifery, and collective wellness.

  • Joy

    We are committed to Joy. Even though the current ecosystem of maternal health continues to be a disservice Black birthing people, we know how to conjure the joy in our birth experiences. We are deserving of all the joy in birth, parenting, and life. CSSBC is a sacred space for Joy.

  • Abundance

    We know that in each other we have all we need, and all we need is what we have (thank you, Desiree Dawson). We believe in abundance. As a community, we possess everything and more to ensure our abundance in freedom, wellness, and legacy. We are rich in culture and community and will always receive.

Donate to the cause

Your Support Matters

Donor contributions help us to develop our beautiful future home and the services we will provide. Chicago South Side Birth Center is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization and all donations are tax deductible.  Our tax ID# is 87-1221956.

We thank you for your support!