STAFF AND COMMITTEE REPORTS
November 17, 2014
Organizational Updates
[This section is a repeat from the October report.... for those who missed it.]
The Bernalillo County Community Health Council (BCCHC) is entering into a transitional stage of our ongoing evolution as an organization. Bernalillo County has discontinued funding for the BCCHC coordinator as a staff position as of October 17th, although they will be entering into a contract with Marsha to continue current support for the Opioid Accountability Initiative on a part-time basis. The voting members of BCCHC have decided to move forward with incorporating BCCHC as a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, and Marsha will remain as the coordinator supported through various contracts, including the Opioid Initiative contract mentioned above and a contract to coordinate the coalition on behalf of BCCHC for the new CDC REACH grant recently received by Presbyterian Healthcare System (see below).
The new Board of Directors will be meeting soon, formed from those current voting members who are interested in continuing in this new expanded capacity, plus additional members who will be recruited to assure representation from multiple sectors of the community. Board members will be responsible for guiding both the organizational development process, as well as the upcoming Community Health Improvement Plan (CHIP) process over the next year.
In addition to specific monthly meetings for the Board of Directors, monthly networking meetings will be continued to encourage broad community participation and sharing of information. These monthly meetings will also provide an opportunity to receive ongoing community input into the CHIP process as that moves forward.
Community Health Improvement Planning (CHIP) Process
BCCHC is participating in a pilot project called the Healthy Communities Transformation Initiative (HCTI) being funded by HUD and based on years of work developing healthy community indices. The HCTI offers two innovative tools: the Healthy Communities Index (HCI) and the Healthy Communities Assessment Tool (HCAT), to help cities assess the physical, social, and economic roots of health of their communities. The tools provide a standard, comprehensive, and practical approach to measuring the most important determinants of health at the neighborhood level. Understanding and tracking these measures can help cities determine the range of policies and programs necessary to help improve community health and residents' quality of life. Wewill be using the new HCAT as a vehicle for sharing small-area-specific indicators with communities to get their input into the CHIP process in early 2015. The project is based locally out of the NM Mortgage Finance Authority (MFA), however the data input will all be done by the NM Community Data Collaborative and BCCHC is designated as the organization to pilot on-the-ground use of the tool. To get an idea of what the site will look like, a beta site in Baltimore can be viewed at
REACH - Communities Leading Healthy Change
Presbyterian Healthcare Services has received a 3-year grant from the CDC program, Racial & Ethnic Approaches to Community Health (REACH), for almost $1 million per year to implement environmental and systems approaches to reduce chronic disease in the International District (focus on Hispanic/Latino population and Native Americans) and the South Valley (focus on Hispanic/Latino population). Several contracts with community-based organizations will work in the areas of improving opportunities for healthy eating, active living and community clinical prevention connections. BCCHC is serving as the coalition for this project, and members will be encouraged to get involved in their areas of interest. Marsha will be contracted to serve as the coordinator of this new Communities Leading Healthy Change coalition that will function within the current BCCHC structure. Pres is in the process of hiring four new staff members for Communities Leading Healthy Change to begin work in December. Contracts for the community initiatives, as well as Marsha's contract are also expected to begin in December.
Opioid Accountability Initiative
The second Opioid Accountability Summit has been scheduled for January 8, 2015, at the CNM Workforce Training Center, 5600 Eagle Rock Ave. NE (NW of Alameda Blvd and I-25). (PLEASE NOTE: The venue has been changed since the October report.) Open registration will be available soon with a link posted on the BCCHC website.A new collaboration is being developed with the US Attorney's Office and the UNM Health Sciences Center, who will be co-sponsoring the Summit. Implementation teams continue meeting (see the July 2014 report for recommendations from each team and contact information). The videos, reports and handouts from the June 12th update meeting have been posted at .
Early Childhood Accountability Partnership (ECAP)
ECAP has received funding from the United Way of Central New Mexico to fund a part-time coordinator position. Tracy McDaniel is leaving her position with the Bernalillo County Office of Health & Social Services/Health Promotion Team to become the new coordinator, effective December 2, 2014. Congratulations, Tracy!
ECAP continues its work as the Early Childhood Collaborative Action Network of Mission: Graduate, focusing on three areas of strategic action:
Strategy 1: Increase awareness and knowledge about importance of early childhood development
Strategy 2: Engage families in support of parenting skills/practices, support services, and transition
Strategy 3: Promote and expand early literacy
For any questions about ECAP activities or how to get involved, contactTracy at .
New Mexico Alliance of Health Councils
NMAHC is moving forward with incorporating as a non-profit. The new Board of Directors is in place and Marsha has been elected chair. One of the priorities for NMAHC continues to be legislation to increase state funding for all health councils. A bill will be introduced in the legislative session beginning in January 2015.
Health in All Policies (HiAP)
The APHA-funded Health in All Policies project continues as a collaboration of NMPHA, NMAHC, NM Health Equity Partnership, NM DOH, NM Health Equity Working Group, NM Chronic Disease Prevention Council, BCCHC, Partnership for a Healthy Torrance County, and Place Matters Teams from Bernalillo County and McKinley County. The goal of the project is to build awareness as a foundation for moving toward a Health in All Policies (HiAP) approach at the state and local levels. Marsha wrote the grant proposal and is coordinating the effort which will result in:1) a presentation to the Legislative Health & Human Services interim committeeon Tuesday, November 25, in which we will request that they establish a NM HiAP Task Force, 2) a train-the-trainer workshop to share the HiAP toolkit that has been developed as part of this project(available at on the afternoon of December 9th at the Embassy Suites Hotel, as a pre-Forum workshop for the NMPHA Health Policy Forum on December 10th, 3) a brief musical presentation at the Forum on December 10th, and 4) participation in Public Health Day at the Roundhouse on Monday, January 26th during the legislative session.
Promise Zone Application
An application for federal designation as a Promise Zone will be submitted on November 21st by the Rio Grande Community Development Corporation (RGCDC). The Promise Zone would cover multiple census tracts ranging from the South Valley over to the International District, up through Downtown and north along the west side of I-25 up to Montaño. The designation does not come with funding, but provides special preference in the federal grant process for projects included in the application. Marsha was responsible for writing the sections for Health & Wellness and for Affordable Housing. She used the REACH/Communities Leading Healthy Change project to do the Health & Wellness plan related to reducing chronic disease, and used both the Opioid Initiative recommendations and the recent Behavioral Health Task Force recommendations to do the Health & Wellness plan on behavioral health. There are many other parts to the application (economic development, creating jobs, education and crime reduction) that are all being written by other folks.