As the demand for community-based public health collaboration continues to increase, concrete, innovative strategies and resources that can help partnerships sustain broad-based collaboration in public health practice have become more necessary. In this session, two community partnerships from the Turning Point Public Health Governance Workgroup - The Caring Community Network of the Twin Rivers (CCNTR) and the Kids First Alliance (KFA) - will present the procedures and structures they are putting in place to support broad, ongoing community involvement in assessing health, setting health priorities, and taking collective action to address priorities. Each community's approach to engaging a broad array of people and organizations, relating to local government, securing sustainable funding, and finding the right organizational structure is unique and tailored to their local context. For example, to overcome challenges inherent in working in a multiple-town region with a weak governmental public health presence, CCNTR is working to establish a three-part, public-private structure to broaden participation, strengthen and coordinate public health activities in the region, and take collective action through regional teams. KFA, which operates in an area with a strong county health department, is working to balance decisionmaking power between government and local communities by establishing neighborhood-level structures and processes that give youth a greater voice in decisions and actions that relate to their health. By hearing and discussing each partnership's take on "how it's done" in their community, session participants will gain insight into the "nitty-gritty" of turning the rhetoric of community participation into practice. See www.cacsh.org
Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of this session the participants will be able to: -Describe two approaches to support sustained community participation in basic public health activities. -Gain a better understanding of the importance of local context in choosing and implementing strategies to sustain community participation in public health.
Keywords: Public Health Infrastructure, Sustainability
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.