Community Links brings troubled young people out of their shells
Community Links, a service of Baltic Street AEH (Advocacy, Employment and Housing), with headquarters at 250 Baltic St. in Cobble Hill, is a kind of “outward bound” for urban youth striving for mental health and a life free of substance abuse.
Not that its clients pitch tents in Prospect Park for nature therapy. Rather the program has three reasons why it’s heading in the right direction.
First, Community Links claims to be unique for New York City in meeting the needs of 18-to-25-year-olds coping with mental illness and substance abuse by providing them services in addition to any clinical treatment they receive.
Second, the program’s staff members are peers, both in age and diagnoses, of the clients they serve, enabling them to identify with and guide them.