Health

Adult Immunization Toolkit Development

Alternative Standards of Care and Alternative Care Sites – Harris County (Houston), Texas

Mike and a team led a meeting of agency and community leaders to plan for the possibility of a severe pandemic influenza.  The meeting helped more than one hundred partners to allocate roles and responsibilities and advance shared plans for their response to a pandemic.  (2011)

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – H1N1 Public Engagement

A fourteen-member team designed and delivered a national public engagement project for CDC to help the agency develop guidance for local, state, federal and private health organizations as they decided how to meet the challenge of the H1N1 virus in the fall and winter flu season of 2009/10. In only sixteen weeks, the team managed ten public meetings, two web engagements and one stakeholder meeting that brought more than 2000 members of the public and representatives of key stakeholders into dialogue with CDC staff and one another in the summer of 2009.  Mike served as the project lead.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – National Health Goals

In 2006, Mike designed and conducted a national public engagement effort to help senior leadership in the agency align their budget with the nation’s most important public health problems.  Mike served as the project manager for a team that led public meetings in Washington, D.C.; Little Rock, Arkansas; Oakland, California; San Antonio, Texas; and Boston, Massachusetts with a national tribal meeting in Denver, Colorado. (2006)

Centura Health – Community Health Improvement Council

Mike worked with the council of leaders from across the organization to identify and address priority health needs within the communities served by the system, establish measures of health improvement, and develop programs to improve diet, exercise, and emotional wellbeing and reduce tobacco use. (2012)

Children’s Health Protection, U.S. EPA

Mike led the work of the Science and Research Work Group of EPA’s Federal Advisory Committee on Children’s Health.  He assisted the work group as its members initiated a new research project to link children’s disease and environmental causes at specific life stages. (2000-2001)

Colorado HIV Prevention and Care Plan

Mike engaged the community stakeholders and the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment in a planning process that will produce the 2014 statewide HIV prevention and care plan (2013-2014)

Community Forum – Huerfano County, Colorado

Mike convened and lead a forum that brings together members of the Huerfano County community and representatives from Shell to discuss oil and natural gas exploration in the county.  The forum is aimed at building relationships, deepening communication and developing common understanding of the engineering, environmental, health and economic issues raised by resource extraction. 

Denver HIV Resources Planning Council Priority-Setting

Mike assisted more than 100 stakeholders to reach consensus on priorities for allocating funding from the Ryan White Care Act and to develop three funding scenarios. This groundbreaking project was the subject of two published accounts of the work it took to build the consensus agreement. 

Fluoride Technical Study Group, City of Ft. Collins, Colorado

Mike facilitated the work of a technical study group charged with reviewing scientific information about the risks and benefits of fluoridating drinking water supplies and reporting those findings to the Board of Health and Water Board so that they might make recommendations to the City Council concerning the practice of adding fluoride to community drinking water supplies.  The Technical Study Group produced a consensus report and, despite conflicting recommendations from the Health Board and the Water Board, the City Council was able to resolve the question and will continue fluoridation. 

Medical Cannabis Pre-Regulatory Public Meetings

Justin worked with the Center for Collaborative Policy to provide support to the California Department of Consumer Affairs and the California Department of Public Health as they worked to develop regulations for the medical cannabis industry.  He facilitated special interest breakout group sessions in meetings statewide, and assisted with meeting logistics planning.

Ozone Reduction Stakeholder Groups, State of Pennsylvania

Mike served as a convener and mediator for six separate ozone reduction efforts.

1. The 1996 Philadelphia stakeholder group: The Philadelphia stakeholders generated a consensus report to the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) recommending regional ozone reduction strategies.
2. A 1997 statewide regulatory negotiation to reduce ozone-producing emissions from auto-body refinishing operations:  The regulatory negotiation was convened as a means of implementing a recommendation of the Philadelphia stakeholders.  The Commonwealth subsequently adopted a new regulation.
3. A 1997 statewide regulatory negotiation (again as part of implementing the prior recommendations) to improve the operating of solvent cleaning and degreasing operations.
4. The 1999 deliberations of an ozone reduction stakeholder group in south central Pennsylvania.
5. A 1999 regional ozone reduction stakeholder group in the Lehigh Valley.
6. In 2001, facilitated the work of a policy review group that advised the Departments of Transportation and Environmental Protection about when, where and how to implement ozone reduction strategies aimed at emissions from vehicles.

He identified potential stakeholders, drafted operating protocols, facilitated negotiating sessions, coordinated with DEP personnel, integrated technical presentations, conducted public meetings and mentored in-house DEP facilitators.  All of the six processes resulted in specific ozone reduction recommendations designed to assist the Commonwealth meet its obligations under the Clean Air Act.  Agency evaluation showed that the Commonwealth significantly improved air quality by reducing the frequency, severity, persistence and spatial extent of high ozone episodes. (1996-2001)

Pandemic Preparedness – Harris County (Houston), Texas

In the summer of 2011, Mike and a team of fourteen helped Harris

County conduct eight public meetings and a meeting with community-based organizations to consider carefully the allocation of resources – vaccines, ventilators and antiviral medication – that would likely be scarce in a severe pandemic.  The public meetings drew in nearly 800 community members. Leaders in the Harris County Public Health and Environmental Services Department used the output to finalize a draft plan for pandemic preparedness. Start-to-finish, the project took thirteen weeks.  

Physician-Assisted Suicide

At the height of the controversy over Dr. Kevorkian’s effort to legalize assisted suicide, Mike initiated, convened and co-facilitated two state-level dialogues on end-of-life issues, including physician-assisted suicide, one in Colorado and a second in California. Participants included religious leaders, health care providers, medical ethicists, right-to-die advocates, pro-life advocates, hospice care providers, government officials and individuals facing end-of-life decisions.  The dialogues produced joint statements on improving end-of-life care and preventing the suffering that leads to requests for assisted suicide.  In California, the group delivered recommendations to the General Assembly’s Select Committee on Palliative Care. (1998 and 2001-2002)

Public Engagement Project: Use of Meningococcal Conjugate Vaccines in Infants

Mike helped the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to design and implement a stakeholder and public engagement process aimed at assisting CDC’s Advisory Council on Immunization Practices (ACIP) to decide whether to add meningococcal vaccines to the infant immunization schedule. Stakeholders ranged from the American Academy of Pediatrics to the Heritage Foundation to the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials. (2011)