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HomeMy WebLinkAboutBOH minutes 052511MINUTES ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH May 25, 2011 Board of Health Minutes Transcription completed by Lisa Smith May 25, 2011 1 ORANGE COUNTY HEALTH DEPARTMENT MISSION STATEMENT: To enhance the quality of life, promote the health, and preserve the environment for all people in the Orange County community. THE ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH MET ON May 25, 2011, at the Southern Human Services Center Chapel Hill, NC. BOARD OF HEALTH MEMBERS PRESENT: Anissa Vines, Chair; Tony Whitaker, Vice Chair; Chris Harlan; Steve Yuhasz, Commissioner Representative; Carol Haggerty; Matthew Kelm; Paul Chelminski; Susan Elmore; Mike Carstens; BOARD OF HEALTH MEMBERS ABSENT: Michael Wood STAFF PRESENT: Rosemary Summers, Health Director; Dorothy Cilenti, Interim Health Director; Wayne Sherman, Personal Health Services Division Director; Donna King, Health Promotion and Education Services Division Director; Erin Langston, Finance and Administrative Operations Director; Lisa Smith, Administrative Assistant GUESTS PRESENT: M Jewel Wray, Human Resources Manager I. Welcome and Introductions Anissa Vines, Chair, called the meeting to order at 7:15 p.m. II. Approval of May 25, 2011 Agenda Motion to approve the Agenda of May 25, 2011 as was made by Carol Haggerty, seconded by Steve Yuhasz, and carried without dissent. III. Public Comment for Items NOT on Printed Agenda none IV. Action Items (Consent) A. Minutes approval of April 27, 2011 meeting The Board is required to review and approve minutes of all meetings of the Board of Health. These minutes were for the regularly scheduled meeting held on April 27, 2011. B. Preparedness Contract with Person County Since 2002, the State of North Carolina has received federal funds from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to ensure that North Carolina is prepared in the event of a public health emergency. Allocated pass through funds enabled Orange County to employ a full-time public health preparedness coordinator (Public Health Nurse II) from 2003 - 2008. Reductions in funding since 2006 make it impossible to support a full-time nursing position with these funds. To ensure that the deliverables as mandated are met, an agreement was developed with Person County in 2008 to share a Preparedness Coordinator position. Upon mutual agreement, Person County hires and supervises the position. Pat Gentry, the Preparedness Coordinator hired by Person County, spends 2 to 2 1/2 days per week in Orange County. The agreement began on December 1, 2008 and has been in effect in fiscal year 2009-10. The amount of the agreement for fiscal year 2011 -2012 remains unchanged at $38,000. There are sufficient MINUTES ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH May 25, 2011 Board of Health Minutes Transcription completed by Lisa Smith May 25, 2011 2 federal funds allocated by the State to Orange County to pay for this agreement. In the event that funds become unavailable, the contract allows the contract to be cancelled. The current allocation covers the full cost of this contract, plus an amount that supports operations for this effort. Motion to approve the consent agenda items was made by Matthew Kelm, seconded by Chris Harlan, and carried without dissent. V. Reports and Discussion with Possible Action A. Follow up from DSS Board Joint Meeting B. Community Health Assessment Listening Sessions An essential component of the Community Health Assessment process involves reporting to and engaging the community in future health action planning. Listening Sessions provide an opportunity to share survey data, receive feedback, and collaboratively discuss positive ‘next steps’. Information gathered from these activities will serve two important functions for the department. First, identification of issues to be addressed in the health department’s Strategic Plan which includes a Health Improvement Plan. Secondly, identification of health issues to be addressed by Healthy Carolinians of Orange County (HCOC) subcommittees and their respective annual action plans. These listening sessions if led by the Board of Health will also fulfill two accreditation requirements that the Board has. After preliminary data analysis of the surveys and focus groups, the Community Health Assessment Leadership Team (CHALT) will identify the top 10 health themes. The Orange County Board of Health (BOH) will invite residents to a presentation of the survey and focus group data and ask them to help make sense of the findings. At least two BOH members should be present to lead each session. The goal is to prioritize and narrow the top 10 health issues to 5-8 issues. At the conclusion of the sessions, the BOH will encourage participants to participate in Healthy Carolinians of Orange County (HCOC) and like organizations addressing health within the community. The Board of Health will report session results to the HCOC Coordinator and health department staff working on the Health Improvement Plan. Note: During the HCOC Annual Meeting, further prioritization will occur resulting in 4-5 key issues to be addressed in HCOC annual action plans. Tentative Host locations: Rogers Road and Efland Cheeks community centers; while the other two will likely be at the two Senior Centers. Note: Health department staff will assist with meeting logistics and coordinate all necessary resources, including taking notes. Support for the sessions has been included in the 2011-2012 budget. Board of Health members will lead four Community Health Listening Sessions with a minimum of two BOH members at each session. MINUTES ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH May 25, 2011 Board of Health Minutes Transcription completed by Lisa Smith May 25, 2011 3 Board members Susan Elmore and Paul Chelminski agreed to attend the August/ September sessions in the evenings. C. State and County Budget Update County budget was released on May 17, 2011. The Manager’s recommended budget excludes vehicles requested by the health department. In addition, it is our understanding based on information from our Budget Analyst that our IT requests will be handled through the county IT budget rather than from the departmental budget. These requests had been submitted to the IT department but it was unclear where the funds should be placed. We still need confirmation from the IT department that our requests for next year will be funded. Vehicles’ not being funded is especially problematic for environmental health. They are one pick up truck short as a result of an accident this year that totaled one of the trucks. Without a replacement vehicle, a staff person will be confined to the office unless another person is absent. The “problematic” equipment that the on-site wastewater staff carries in their trucks includes a sludge judge and an auger. As the name indicates, the “judge” is contaminated with sewage from septic tanks and cannot be carried in the back of an enclosed vehicle that cannot be readily hosed down or cleaned. The budget for next year did not include any new equipment, furnishings or IT equipment that is a result of the renovation project. We expect to fold those into the project costs. The state budget is still unclear. The most recent update possible will be provided at the meeting. Commissioner work sessions for departmental budget questions are scheduled for May 26. Outside agency, reviews are scheduled for a June 6 work session. D. Health Director Recruitment The Health Director posting has been distributed to a variety of venues. Each venue has their own posting requirements which in some cases limited the information that was provided. Jewel Wray can provide a list of venues in which she has successfully posted this opening. The closing date is June 13, 2011 for applications. In order to proceed in a timely manner, a draft timeline has been developed that will help guide the Board in the various steps involved in the recruitment process. This will ensure that both the Board meets the deadlines necessary to move forward and that the Human Resources staff meets deadlines required by the Board. The board agreed on potential community agency members, Health Agency members, Local Public Health Directors, and County Representatives for the Health Directors interview panel. Board members agreed to contact potential panel members and contact Administrative Assistant Lisa Smith with confirmed names and contact information. Lisa Smith will send Human Resource Manager Jewel Wray the list of confirmed names and contact information by Friday June 1, 2011. H. Informational Items MINUTES ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH May 25, 2011 Board of Health Minutes Transcription completed by Lisa Smith May 25, 2011 4 Informational items are provided to the Board to cover topics that Board members should be aware of or for general interest. Items are not discussed during the meeting unless Board members ask for discussion. No informational items presented were selected for discussion or questions at this meeting. A synopsis of the items follows. 1. Health Director Report The final two positions in the new Finance and Administrative Operations Division have been filled. You will meet Erin Langston, the Director of the Division at the Board meeting. Erin most recently worked with the City of Dallas Texas in several different departments and has experience in Charlotte and as a Peace Corps volunteer in Honduras. She is a graduate of the MPA program at UNC. Steven Campbell has been hired as the new Informational Technology Support Analyst for the Health Department and will begin work on May 25. He will likely attend the Board meeting in June to be introduced. Mr. Campbell has more than 7 years of experience with UNC Information Technology and was assigned to the School of Public Health. In addition, he has experience with IBM. We are very pleased that these two individuals will complete the reorganization of this division. We have one additional staff retirement, Diane Perry a communicable disease nurse who has also handled our refugee health screenings will be retiring June 3. We are temporarily reassigning staff to cover the duties in this position while we seek permission to fill the vacancy. Staff is currently waiting for Piedmont Health Services to respond to our contract proposal for a ½ time shared position to provide medical nutrition therapy and diabetes self management programs specifically for one of their Alamance locations. As the Board will recall we currently have a half-time nutritionist position vacant that is difficult to fill because it is part-time. This position “upgrade” to full time was included in our budget and is a part of the County Manager’s recommended budget. At the Smart Start Board meeting this morning, we heard a report from the Allocations Committee on funding for the upcoming fiscal year. The House budget that was passed includes Smart Start but contains a 20% cut. Because this partnership is one of the original ones in the state and it therefore has more funding than more recently organized agencies, it will take a proportionately higher percentage of the cuts; anticipated to be 35%. The Senate’s version is still out. The recommendation was to fund the Families in Focus Program and the Child Care Health Consultant/NAPSACC Programs, but funding levels cannot be determined at this time. The funding for these programs is nearly all tied up in salary and benefits support for one social worker II and one public health nurse II. Without full funding, these programs will not be able to be sustained. Next week staff will discuss options to discontinue these programs now and transfer staff to the two vacant positions we have available that are suitable for the currently employed staff. If a decision is made to take a chance on full funding, there may need to be a subsequent reduction in force if funding is not allocated by the legislature. The House Budget transfers the Health and Wellness Trust Fund in part to the Division of Public Health and discontinues the teen tobacco program for next year. This means that we would lose a health education position that leads this successful program with both school systems. We are currently examining our options for retaining the excellent staff member that is currently employed in this position. The Health Director’s Association is considering how to collaborate with Senator Hartsell around his legislative proposals to regionalize public health. There will be many challenges around bringing this model to fruition. MINUTES ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH May 25, 2011 Board of Health Minutes Transcription completed by Lisa Smith May 25, 2011 5 Wayne Sherman reports that the renovation completion of Phase I (the medical clinic portion) of Whitted Human Services is slated for June 27 move date. It is anticipated that the dental portion of the renovation will then be completed around mid-late August. We are in the process of mailing a one page letter and one page survey to dental clients who received services from us in Carrboro over the past two years. The letter describes the transition of services and the survey asks for information on transportation they anticipate needing to access services in Hillsborough. It also asks whether they would be interested in early or late appointments. We expect to receive surveys back by mid-June to be able to gauge transportation needs. Informally we have heard that most clients are planning on riding with friends if they do not have their own transportation. Please note the media articles on the adolescent immunization “contest”. Orange County School parents have had nothing but positive comments on the campaign. Chapel Hill Carrboro City Schools have had some parent push back on the vaccination efforts, partially centered around vaccine safety issues, but more to point on the exclusion of children with religious exemptions from the ability to “win” the prizes being offered. We are trying to use this as an opportunity to get messages out about the importance of these vaccinations. Dr. Rosemary Summers ended on a personal note, thanking the Board for its support over the years both for the department and for me personally. The resolution and the breakfast celebration with staff and Board members was a wonderful “cap” to 30 years of public service, especially in my “hometown”. She wished the Board the best in the search for the new director and knows that they will support a new director in the same way as they did with her in the past. 2. Pending and Recurring Items for the Board’s review of upcoming agendas. VII. Board Comments/Announcements VIII. Adjournment Motion to adjourn the meeting at 9:40 p.m. was made by Chris Harlan, seconded by Matthew Kelm, and carried without dissent. The next Board of Health Meeting will be held June 22, 2011 at the Government Services Center Hillsborough, NC at 7:00 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Rosemary L. Summers, MPH, DrPH Health Director Secretary to the Board MINUTES ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH May 25, 2011 Board of Health Minutes Transcription completed by Lisa Smith May 25, 2011 1