As Administrator of the Dent County Health Center, one of my goals is to improve our working relationship with our county residents, businesses, and organizations. After all, I believe that every one of us shares the mission of the Dent County Health Center, which is to improve and protect the health of Dent County residents.
With that mission in mind, the Dent County Health Center, its employees, and our partners at the Healthy Dent County Prevention Coalition, are joining together to build our relationships and learn more about the changes we can implement as a community to improve our collective health.
We understand that actions taken during the COVID-19 pandemic hurt our trust with some community members. We want to build that back and prove that we are working in the best interest of our community. Going forward, we hope to make decisions, policies, programs, and take actions that the community supports and wants, in order to improve and protect the health of Dent County residents.
In the coming weeks and months, employees and partners in our Building Communities for Better Health (BCBH) program, will be doing just that. Our goal is to get to know as many business owners and residents as possible. We already have good relationships with our leaders in the community, such as law enforcement, school leadership, aldermen, and the county commissioners, but it’s the residents and businesspeople we want to get to know.
We want to know your struggles, and your ideas for making things better. We want to know how the Dent County Health Center can make positive change for Salem, or at the very least, support others in their efforts to do so.
We have specific areas in mind that we think are problems. We have ideas for how we might address those problems. But, we could be totally off-base. So, we’re going to keep our mouths shut and just listen to the community and let them tell us what we should do.
Our efforts are not limited to any one specific topic, but we do have some issues that have already been brought to our attention. These topics, among others, will come up as you see us out and about in the community.
Areas of Focus:
Our BCBH Grant focuses on these two areas. However, we exist to serve the community, and if issues fall outside of these two areas, we will still be involved and help to make the needed change.
Youth and Workplace Tobacco and Marijuana Smoke Exposure
We have many concerned parents, teachers, and police officers tell us that their young children are exposed to tobacco and marijuana too early in their lives. Vaping, in particular, is becoming a big problem in our high school and middle schools. In addition, children are exposed to smoke in places like the city park and some restaurants in Salem. As we all know, cigarette smoking and vaping is harmful to everyone’s lungs and health, but it is especially detrimental to our children, who are still developing and can become addicted to the nicotine in these products more easily than adults.
More information on the detrimental effects of secondhand smoke can be found here.
Though Salem currently has no clean air ordinance in place, the vast majority of local businesses have already taken the important steps of making it a business policy to be smoke-free. It’s a smart business practice.
We would love to hear the community’s ideas for addressing this issue.
Active Transportation (Walking and Biking)
We see this constantly. Many people in our city don’t have cars or can’t drive or don’t want to drive for whatever reason. However, many critical areas of our city don’t have sidewalks, and we have no bike lanes in Salem. Being able to get around without a car is critical! The City of Salem has already started to address this issue. They have created and adopted an Active Transportation Plan and a Complete Streets policy. These are steps in the right direction, but a plan doesn’t build sidewalks or make the streets more friendly to pedestrians and bikes.
It’s important to remember that we all are pedestrians at some point. We can’t drive inside the grocery store. Pedestrian access is access for everyone. Plus, walking and biking promote a healthy lifestyle in general with the added exercise they represent.
Conclusion
In summary, the Dent County Health Center is making a concerted effort to be more involved in the community and to seek our grassroots solutions to our health issues with the overarching goal of improving and protecting the health and safety of Dent County residents. We hope that residents will feel comfortable voicing their opinions in whatever form they desire, through in-person meetings, emails, phone calls, or social media. Together we will find the best path forward to improve our collective health.