Health Equity Resource Act Meeting August 11 Open to Public

From the Community Health Resources Commission Website:

“In 2021, the Maryland General Assembly approved legislation during the 2021 legislative session, “The Maryland Health Equity Resource Act .”  This Act provides significant new grant funding and state resources for local communities to address health disparities, improve health outcomes, expand access to primary care and prevention services, and help reduce health care costs.  The Maryland Community Health Resources Commission (CHRC) will implement this Act with the assistance of the Health Equity Resource Community (HERC) Advisory Committee, the Maryland Department of Health’s Office of Minority Health and Health Disparities, and Chesapeake Regional Information System for our Patients (CRISP).

The HERC Advisory Committee members were recently appointed and are listed below. Click here​ for a copy of the release announcing these appointments.

The CHRC and HERC Advisory Committee are holding the​ first meeting on the Maryland Health Equity Act on August 11 at 1:00 pm. The meeting will be held at 100 Community Place, Crownsville. The meeting will be open to the public, and individuals will be able to attend either in-person or virtually. For those wishing to attend in-person, we will follow social distancing practices, encouraging wearing masks. For those wishing to attend virtually, we will provide details about how to join virtually before the meeting on August 11th.

If you are interested in attending this meeting or would like to be added to an email distribution list about the HERC Initiative, please ​​​​contact Mark Luckner, CHRC Executive Director at mark.luckner@maryland.gov.

At the meeting on August 11, the CHRC and HERC Advisory Committee will discuss the timeline to apply for initial grant funding that is available under the Health Equity Resource Act. Following the meeting on August 11, CHRC staff will provide information about the timeline to apply for grant funding on its website.

HERC Advisory Committee:  The HERC Advisory Committee will provide guidance and assistance to the CHRC in the following areas: implementation of the HERC program; HERC program evaluation and data collection metrics; preparation of an annual report on the program; and strategies for tax incentives and loan repayments to assist HERCs in achieving their mission.

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The following members have been appointed to the HERC Advisory Committee:

​The Honorable Edward J. Kasemeyer, Chair, Community Health Resources Commission and Chair of the HERC Advisory Committee

Noel Brathwaite, PhD, MSPH, Director, Minority Health and Health Disparities, Maryland Department of Health

Alyssa L. Brown, JD, Director, Innovation, Research, and Development, Office of Health Care Financing, Maryland Department of Health

Rebecca A. Altman, RN and MBA, Vice President and Chief Integration Officer, LifeBridge Health

Elizabeth L. Chung, Executive Director, Asian American Center of Frederick

Michelle Spencer, MS, Associate Chair, Inclusion, Diversity, Anti-Racism, and Equity, Department of Health Policy and Management, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Maura Dwyer, DrPH and MPH, Senior Officer, the Health Impact Project, The Pew Charitable Trusts

Jonathan Dayton, MS, NREMT, Community Relations and Population Health Supervisor, Mt. Laurel Medical Center

Mikayla A. Walker, MPH, Management Consultant with ReefPoint Group in developing elder care national planning strategies for the Veteran Health Agency

Jacqueline J. Bradley, MSN, MSS, CRNP, Bradley Consulting, LLC, and former Adult Nurse Practitioner, Kaiser Permanente for more than twenty years, and lead Nurse Practitioner for Community Ambassador Program at Kaiser (now retired from Kaiser)

The Honorable John A. Hurson, Esq., former Chair, Maryland Community Health Resources Commission​

​For more information or to be added to an email distribution list about the HERC Initiative, please contact Mark Luckner, CHRC Executive Director, at mark.luckner@maryland.gov.”