CHIP June Update

Greetings CHIP Partners,

The past month has brought upheaval across our community and country as we face the ongoing impact of racism on the life, health, and well-being of our community. In the face of the brutal racism that has harmed and killed so many Black and Brown people in America, and in the midst of a viral pandemic disproportionately affecting Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC), the call is clear to support each other in working for equity and justice.

On Friday, June 26, the Buncombe County Health and Human Services Board will be addressing making a Proclamation of Racism as a Public Health Crisis along with a call to action. This step forward by our local health leadership is in no small part due to years of tireless advocacy from so many of you. Thank you!  

At our upcoming virtual CHIP Advisory Council meeting on Thursday June 25th we will begin to prepare for how to support this proclamation and what actions we may want to take as our Advisory. This conversation will also include how we might engage our respective and partner organizations.  After Friday's HHS Board meeting we will also follow up with you about next steps that may be identified based on the Board discussion.

Thursday's agenda will also include finalizing and putting into action shared equity principles that guide CHIP Advisory Council efforts to dismantle structural racism in our community.  Continuing our intention to learn from and support leaders of color in Buncombe County, we will also get an update from Rob Thomas of the Racial Justice Coalition on the work the RJC is doing to advocate for racial justice, address implicit bias and dismantle structural racism.

Please visit our blog pages frequently for updated information and resouces.  Noteworthy additions to our Support page include new job postings at the United Way and the Area Agency on Aging.  Let month we introduced you to resources from Public Health Awakened. You'll find a new resource from them on how public health can support Black Lives Matter protests on our Engage page (even includes public health messaging for your protest sign). You'll find upcoming webinars posted on our Learn page including Building & Measuring Community Power for Health Justice on Thursday. County Rankings and Roadmaps launched a webinar series on COVID-19 Response and Recovery with COVID-19: Disproportionate Impact on Black Communities also scheduled for Thursday.  All webinars are recorded for you to view at a later time. 

We've added a number of new additions to our Resources page this week.  In particular we want to highlight resources recently shared with Mothering Asheville partners in response to community frustration with the limited mental health clinicians of color in Asheville. You'll also find a new curated collection by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation of articles on the Coronovirus pandemic with a focus on health equity on our Resources page.

Take good care,

The Buncombe CHIP Leadership Team

CHIP Update May 20

Greetings CHIP Partners!

Much has changed over the past two months and we are all revisiting how we best support the needs of our community.  At the May CHIP Advisory meeting we spent much of our time discussing what key issue areas to pursue together over these next weeks and months.  

The overarching theme that emerged from this conversation was equity with the greatest priority on ensuring that everyone in our community has access to testing, treatment and other resources they need to manage this crisis.  The next most commonly voiced priorities were working together to address Economic Equity; Advocacting at the state or national level for appropriate resources for housing, childcare, financial support in this time of crisis; and  Advocacy for increased funding for our fragile early education system. The meeting recording, slides and process work notes around key issues can be found on our CHIP Blog page.

To continue to support these priorities we are trying to share as much accurate information about testing and treatment so that you with "boots on the ground" or connections to trusted community resources can get this information to those in need.  In return, we need to hear what YOU need to effectively communicate with those in need.  Please visit our blog pages frequently for updated information and resouces.  Below are a few new additions to our Support, Engage and Learn Blog Pages to find out what's new.

Updates on Information about COVID-19 and resources to address local needs

• Community testing to reach low-access communities - the most current information on testing in Buncombe County and a schedule and flyers on in-community testing 
• Buncombe County COVID-19 Coronavirus Case Dashboard has been newly added to the County's Community COVID-19 page.
• Buncombe County's Self-Checker Tool is a quick tool anyone can use online or by phone to help assess symptoms of COVID-19 and provide guidance on getting care or testing. It also assists public health to better understand how the virus is spreading inform our community's response.
• Pisgah Legal's Emergency Benefits Guide provides an overview of what individuals eligible for public benefits such as Food Stamps/EBT, Unemploment and Health Insurance should know about how to access benefits during the COVID-19 response. 
• A NEW section on Resources for Non-profits and Community Organizations Responding to COVID-19 including grants and other opportunities

Opportunities and Resources for Advocacy

• Advocacy platforms and tools from Human Impact Partners, RESULTS and Mom's Rising
• Locally produced Let's Talk Webinars and Broadcasts (next week topics are the local justice response to COVID-19 and a conversation about Mental Health and Wellbeing)
• An Equitable Systems Transformation Framework for COVID-19
• WNC's newly released report on COVID-19 & Health Disaprities in WNC
• Public Health Awakened and The Spirit of 1848 COVID-19 an ever-growing database of public health responses to COVID-19

Learning Opportunities

• Webinar: How can we ensure equitable access to COVID-19 treatment? hosted by UNC Gillings School of Public Health on June 2nd.

Also, as we continue to connect virtually, we would like to make sure that we can all equally participate. We are learning more about ways to better use technology and to provide our partners with tools and resources they need to better navigate this virtual world. We'll be taking steps to make sure materials or requests for input, to the extent possible, are shared in advance of our meetings.  Please reach out to us to let us know what challenges or needs you have that make participating in virtual meetings difficult. We will be building out some resources for how to work better in the virtual environment. Look for these starting in the next few days on our Learning and Resources pages.

We hope these resources are helpful for you and your communities.

Take good care!

The Buncombe CHIP Leadership Team

Buncombe County COVID Testing Update - May 11

We want to make sure that you are up to date and have the info you need to discuss  testing for COVID-19 testing in our community, now that testing is more available and being encouraged for those who have symptoms.

Buncombe County Government and Western North Carolina Community Health Services (WNCCHS) will partner to offer community-based COVID-19 testing in the coming weeks for people who are experiencing symptoms of COVID-19. This is an important and necessary step in understanding and addressing the spread of COVID-19 in Buncombe County.

Due to historic and present-day inequities, BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) communities are being disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 both locally and nationally. Buncombe County Emergency Operations Center’s Rapid Response & Recovery Equity Action Team is identifying the testing site locations based on an equity analysis reliant on relevant data and community input.

WNCCHS medical clinic staff will collect specimens from those with symptoms of COVID-19, send the specimens for testing through a commercial lab, and communicate with everyone tested when esults return. Buncombe County Communicable Disease nurses will contact those individuals with lab-confirmed COVID-19 to provide guidance and perform contact tracing. The Buncombe County Emergency Operations Center has made arrangements for safe isolation and quarantine lodging for residents who may need additional resources to limit the spread of coronavirus to others in their household.

Who Should Get Tested?

People who are experiencing symptoms of COVID-19 should be tested for COVID-19. Only those who are symptomatic for COVID-19 will be tested at these sites. 

COVID-19 symptoms may include:

• Cough
• Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing
• Fever
• Sore throat
• Chills
• Repeated shaking with chills
• Muscle pain
• Headache
• New loss of taste or smell

Those who live in Buncombe County are encouraged to use the COVID-19 Self-Checker to assess  whether or not they should be tested for COVID-19. 

What Are the Costs?

Testing is available to both the insured and uninsured, with no out of pocket cost. Those with health insurance should bring their insurance information with them to the testing site. Language access services will be available at all sites during hours of operation.

Where Can someone be Tested?

Special Community-Based testing

These community-based testing sites will be outdoors at the following dates and locations.  This testing is specifically for those with limited access to a healthcare provider who is testing for COVID-19, financial barriers to obtaining a test, or those who have no direct healthcare access are  encouraged to use the community testing sites. 

These sites are part of a continuation a long-term collaboration between the WNC Community Health Services and Buncombe County Health and Human Services. 

Language access services will be available at all sites during hours of operation.

Hillcrest Community Center  

100  Atkinson St,

Tuesday, May 12, 2020
1pm-4pm

Asheville, NC 28801

Buncombe County Schools Central Office

175 Bingham Rd, Asheville, NC 28806

Thursday, May 14, 2020

1pm-4pm

Ongoing Community Testing Sites

Increased testing to meet expanded needs of those who are unable to obtain COVID19 testing through their primary care provider and not able or eligible to participate in the Hillcrest and Emma Community testing events.

MAHEC Family Health Center at Biltmore Mercy Urgent Care, and Range Urgent Care have all expanded testing access. Please see a map here of COVID-19 testing locations and call before you arrive for testing.

If you have questions about COVID-19 testing in Buncombe County

Please visit www.buncombeready.org or call the Ready Team at (828) 419-0095, Monday-Friday, 8 a.m.-5:30 p.m. 

March 23rd CHIP Update

Dear Community Partners and Key Stakeholders,

We are reaching out to you as important contributors to our community's response to COVID-19.

This is an unprecedented time.  We are so grateful for all of the work you are doing to support individuals and families in our community! 

We wanted to share with you a few resources that may be helpful AND seek your assistance in promoting them:

1.  United Way of Asheville Buncombe County is now hosting information about community resources that will be updated regularly by United Way's 211.  100 individuals, including community organizations, are working diligently to identify up to date resources that are safely serving our community.  If you know of resources that should be added please contact 211info@unitedwayabc.org. 

2. Hands On Asheville-Buncombe is coordinating volunteers to support our community's response.  You can register your volunteer needs and sign up to volunteer here.

3.  Frameworks Institute has developed a resource to guide us in common language during this time of crisis:

• Connect individual action to the common good by using a broad 'us.'            "When we wash our hands and keep our distance, we protect everyone in our community.  Let's come together by staying apart."
• Make an explicit moral argument for addressing specific populations' needs."The right thing to do is ensure we all have what we need to be well - regardless ofhow we earn a living or how much we make. People already pushed to the brink bylow wages and high housing costs will be most affected by this virus and an economic slowdown.  This is the time to live up to our ideal of justice for all."
• Look for opportunities to talk about the positive aspects of interconnection.      "We're being reminded just how connected we all are - and how much we depend onone another. And it's not just the spread of the virus. For everyone who works fromhome, there are many more who make that possible by working at the hospital, thepower plant, the grocery store, the delivery service. This moment shows us how much we all need each other to keep going."

Opportunities to Support Each Other's Work AND Our Community:
Many of our partners are engaging in advocacy efforts across the community and state.  You'll continue to find these on our Engage Page. If you wish to share opportunities let us know.  Don't forget that you can share these on our Facebook Page.

Children First/Communities In Schools of Buncombe County is promoting an opportunity to prioritize childcare, paid leave, and health care coverage in the Phase 3 COVID relief bill being acted on by US Congress.

Our Voice asks that you continue to broadly share their Family Violence Survey.

Buncombe County Partnership for Children asks for you to also continue to share a survey with parents or caregivers of children ages 0-5 that will help inform a new parenting program. You'll find the spanish language version and promotion flyers on our Support page. 

The NC Center for Nonprofits is collecting information from NC-based non-profit organizations about their needs stemming from COVID-19.  You don't need to be a member of the Center in order to response to the survey.

Reliable Resources about COVID:
We are continuing to update our Resources Page with reliable information.  If there is something you would like to see us post, please let us know.

Our next Advisory Council meeting will be held remotely on Thursday 4/2/2020.  We will send login information and instructions closer to the time. It will focus on COVID information, resources and a discussion of how we can consider equity in our response. 


Take good care. 

Warmly, 
The Buncombe CHIP Leadership Team

March CHIP Update - CHIP during COVID-29

Dear Community Partners and Key Stakeholders,

We are reaching out to update you on changes in our work related to the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19). As a Community Health Improvement Advisory Council, our role is shifting to support the prevention and treatment of this disease. We invite you to partner with us in this evolving work in order to better support the people you serve across our community. 

A few actions you can take and promote through your networks include:

1. Sign up for BC Alerts by texting BCAlerts to 888-777 from your cell phone. Make sure to include the hyphen!  You will receive a response asking for your zipcode for more targeted alert info.
2. Email non-medical questions, concerns and resources related to preparedness and treatment to ready@buncombe.org. You can also send available resources directly to us through Terri March so we can collect and disseminate them. 
3. Access resources and refer others to BuncombeCounty.org/bcready.
4. If your organization would like to become more involved and engaged, please contact Zo Mpofu about regular meetings of an epidemiology group. 
5. Review the following linked documents to help inform your work and conversations with others: the Governor's State of Emergency declaration, a statement from Race Forward (home to the Government Alliance on Race and Equity or GARE) on The Coronavirus Emergency, Official Response and Its Impacts on Communities of Color, an Equity Message Guidance document to promote inclusive language and less stigmatizing terminology in talking about COVID-19, a Glossary of Terms to help understand the language being used by public health, community officials and the media in discussing the virus and finally a SAMHSA guidance document on supporting behavioral health during social isolation.
6. to promote inclusive language and less stigmatizing terminology in talking about COVID-19, a Glossary of Terms to help understand the language being used by public health officials, community officials and the media in discussing the virus and finally a SAMHSA guidance document on supporting behavioral health during social isolation.  You'll also find all of these on our CHIP Blog Resources Page

We will keep you informed of developments through email and other means. We will also be sharing positive community health resources not related to this disease through the Facebook page and invite you to do the same: https://www.facebook.com/BuncombeCHIP/ . We will also share learning opportunities on our Learn Blog page.

We also want to let you know about two important survey processes being conducted by partnerrs. Our Voice asks that you broadly share their Family Violence Survey and Buncombe County Partnership for Children aks you to share a survey with parents or caregivers of children ages 0-5 that will help inform a new parenting program. You'll find the spanish language version and promotion flyers on our Support page. 

Our next Advisory Council meeting will be remote, and we will send login information and instructions closer to the time. It will focus on COVID information, resources and a discussion of how we can consider equity in our response. 

As Dr. Mandy Cohen, our State Health and Human Services Secretary, has said, Let’s be guided by compassion and reason and work to support each other as a community.”

Take good care. 

Warmly, 

The Buncombe CHIP Leadership Team

February 2020 CHIP Update

Dear Community Partners and Key Stakeholders,

February is Black History Month and it is important to reflect on the impact of the history of Black Americans on their health and the health of our communities.  We have provided a number of community and learning opportunities on our Learn page.  If you missed our screening of Power to Heal:  Medicare and the Civil Rights Revolution at our January CHIP Advisory meeting, there is another opportunity hosted by Asheville Parks and Recreation on February 24th at the Linwood Crump Community Center followed by a group discussion.  The City of Asheville Office of Equity & Inclusion and Rainbow Community School's Black History IS American History Film Series  includes 4 films also followed by discussion with the intent to spark dialogue and racial healing.  As redlining is a significant part of our community's history, Health Begins is offering the webinar Redlining & Health Equity: How Health Systems Can Help Dismantle Structural Racism on March 4th.  Among the presenters is Rishi Manchanda and Josie Williams from the Greensboro Housing Coalition, and one of the initial NC Community Centered Health Home cohort along with Mothering Asheville.  

If you have other opportunities you would like CHIP staff to share, please either share directly on our Facebook page or reach out to Terri to add to our blog resources.  Continuing to think about housing's role in equity, on January 14, 2020, HUD formally published a proposed rule in the Federal Register that would redefine the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule (AFFH), eliminating its focus on addressing residential segregation. Join the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Build Healthy Places Network for a webinar on Wednesday, February 19 at 11 am to learn more about the proposed change, what it could mean for health equity and what communities can do to respond.

Thanks to all of you who participated in input sessions to help craft Healthy North Carolina 2030 which has just been published!  Western North Carolina had the largest number of community members participate in statewide input sessions. This document, with it's health indicators and targets, will serve as the State’s Health Improvement Plan for the next decade and is an important reference and guide to support all the work we do.  The 2030 guidelines have taken a major step forwarded in including a indicators that address a broader view of the influences on health and well-being with a much needed emphasis on health disparities and in assuring that the state collects and provides disaggrated data to the greatest extent possible.  Thanks also to Zo Mpofu for serving on one of the working groups that helped guide this process!

Our January CHIP Advisory Council ended abruptly with a fire alarm as we were discussing what changes and emerging issues our community is experiencing since finalizing our CHA process.  These will be included in our State of the County Health (SOTCH) report due to the NC Department of Public Health in a few weeks.  We gathered up all the notes that were left on the table and added them to our list, however we want to gives those present (as well as community partners who do not attend the Advisory Council) an opportunity to review and provide additional imput.  You can find the summary here.  Please email Terri any input.  Many of you know that we are in the process of developing an application for organizations or existing coalitions to serve as chairs (or co-chairs) for coalitions that will guide the CHIP work around Birth Equity and around Mental Health and Wellbeing.  This is a change and one that we hope will further ground this work in community.  We had great input and insight into the structure and content of the application at our February CHIP Advisory as well as from those who served/are serving in this capacity from the previous cycle (thank you!!!!).  A small group of individuals have volunteered to provide some additional review as we finalize the application.  If you would like to be part of this process as well, please let us know!

We are also excited to announce that the CHIP Advisory unanimously voted to have Jacylyn Kiger, Chief Operations Officer with Pisgah Legal Services will serve as our new co-chair. 

We are sharing two ways for you to engage this month. We hope you will consider participating in a survey to inform VAYA's annual community needs assessement.   You'll find more information and a flyer to share with others on our Engage Blog page.  Also, now is the time to use your “trusted voices” to raise awareness on the 2020 Census.  You'll find resources and a listing of related local community events on the at the League of Women Voters of AVL/Buncombe website.

Keep up-to-date on more timely information and partner updates on our Facebook page. You'll also find resources and learning opportunities on our blog pages. We try to keep up-to-date on postings related to ways to support our partners and engage in advocacy.  
Please help us better support your organizations and advocacy platforms by sharing your info on our Blog and Facebook pages. And, of course, you can send content to Terri at anytime.

With gratitude,

The CHIP Team!

CHIP Update Holiday Edition

Dear Community Partners and Key Stakeholders,

We are very fortunate to work with such a dedicated group of individuals and organizations on the CHIP Advisory Committee and our throughout the community. Your engagement and support will help to move the needle on our disparate infant mortality and mental health focus areas. 

We thank you for your service and wish you a wonderful holiday season!

 Jan and Frank  

Before many of you begin taking time away to spend with family and friends during holiday celebrations, please note that the first CHIP Advisory Council meeting will shift to the second Thursday (January 9th) and will be open to anyone who would like to attend.  AARP and ABIPA will be hosting a screening of The Power to Heal: Medicare and the Civil Rights Revolution.  This powerful film tells the story of the historic struggle to secure equal and adequate access to healthcare for all Americans and is being hosted by ABIPA and AARP.  You can view the film trailer here (although it does a poor job of providing a sense of this documentary's power).  

Given we will provide breakfast, please take a minute to RSVP at http://bit.ly/PowerToHeal_RSVP, even if you normally attend.  And please share!

We also want to provide a quick update on the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners presentation on December 3rd as well as thank those of you who showed up to demonstrate your support!  We were very pleased with the response we received. The Commissioners were receptive and many of them clearly expressed their support for our work to address Birth Equity and Mental Health & Well-being as well as the work to advance cross-sector collaboration to undo racism. Several commissioners specifically spoke to the value of what we shared to developing the county strategic priorities  The video from that meeting has not yet been posted, but you can view the slides here.

With gratitude from the whole CHIP Team, 
We wish you joy, peace and hope as we move into the new year!