MOBILIZING FOR A HEALTHIER MENDOCINO COUNTY

New Report and June Workshop Lay the Groundwork

On June 8, community leaders from across Mendocino County will convene in an all-day Community Health Improvement Planning (CHIP) Workshop at the Ukiah Conference Center. The meeting, hosted by the Community Health Needs Assessment Planning Group, is the first step in building a new county-wide initiative to improve the health and well-being of our County.

As they think through priorities and goals, workshop participants will look at questions such as these:

‣ What factors have the greatest negative―and positive―impact on health in Mendocino County?

‣ What population groups and geographic areas are most vulnerable?

‣ What changes would make it easier for local residents to live healthy lives and fulfill their potential?

‣ What existing programs and initiatives are addressing major concerns, and what other community strengths can we draw on? Most importantly:

‣ Where can we make a strategic difference by combining our efforts and resources? In other words, what can we accomplish through a broad-based partnership that is less possible through more narrowly-defined efforts?

The findings of a year-long Community Health Needs Assessment (CHNA) provide the launching pad for the new initiative. The Assessment was planned, supported, and conducted by a coalition of organizations including the Alliance for Rural Community Health, Frank R. Howard Memorial Hospital, Mendocino County Health and Human Services Agency, North Coast Opportunities/Community Action, and Ukiah Valley Medical Center. They formed a collaborative CHNA Planning Group to work together on community health assessment and improvement because their clients, problems, and solutions are intertwined and all are affected by the same influences (“social determinants of health”) in the realms of housing, education, transportation, the economy, the environment, and more. The Healthy Mendocino Steering Committee is helping to coordinate the project.

The CHNA report is posted on the HealthyMendocino.org website and can be seen here. The report compiles information on local health and well-being drawn from four sources: a survey of nearly 1,500 County residents; interviews with community leaders; a self-assessment of and by the public health system (broadly defined); and the 150-plus community health indicators found on HealthyMendocino.org. A Summary report describing the CHNA process and highlighting key findings introduces the data reports.

At the June 8 workshop, the participants will review the CHNA findings, discuss new inputs and ideas, and target the top priorities for collective action. All the social determinants named above―housing, education, and so on―will be on the radar for attention as priorities and strategies are considered. After that, the next steps are to identify measurable objectives for each priority, followed by the critical work of developing and carrying out action plans. The broader the coalition of organizations and residents taking part in the effort, the more that can be achieved.

Mendonesians can learn a great deal by looking at the community health initiatives taking place across the country and in our own back yard. In Sonoma County’s Health Action initiative, for example, community teams are working toward ten goals in the areas of health care improvement, educational attainment, and economic wellness.  You can learn about them at http://www.sonomahealthaction.org/about. And in Napa County, a community coalition is working on a broad set of health improvement goals in the Live Healthy Napa County initiative http://www.countyofnapa.org/lhnc/. Such communities are showing that when many sectors work together toward common goals, they can achieve positive lasting results more cost effectively. The sectors include government, business, schools, health care, public health, social service organizations, and more.

If you would like to attend the June 8 workshop, please contact Healthy Mendocino Coordinator Patrice Mascolo at healthymendocino@ncoinc.org, or 467-3228. And watch this site for updates in the coming weeks and months.

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Community Health Needs Assessment Planning Group, Susan Baird Kanaan, Paula Cohen, Sandy O’Ferrall, Catherine Rada, Samantha Kinney, Julie Beardsley, Mile Gordon, Sue Haun, Patrice Mascolo.