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T Benicio Gonzales has been named the Director of the Center for Health Equity at the Department of Public Health and Wellness. He had served as the center’s Interim Director since last year.
Gonzales came to the Center for Health Equity in 2010 and has taken on increasingly higher-responsibility roles as a Community Health Specialist, Training Coordinator, Executive Administrator, Assistant Director and Interim Director.
Gonzales is recognized as a national expert on equity issues and is frequently asked to consult with health departments and other organizations across the country. Recent presentations at national conferences have included Promoting Health Equity: The Intersection of Social Justice and Psychology to the Great Lakes Regional Counseling Psychology Conference in Louisville; Restructuring a Local Health Department to More Effectively Address Health Equity to the American Public Health Association Annual Meeting in San Diego and Using Our Power to Advance Racial Equity to the Summit on Government Performance & Innovation in Los Angeles.
He has also been a co-author of many of the Center’s recent reports including Coming Together for Hope, Healing & Recovery: A Plan to Address Substance Use and Misuse in Louisville (2018), the 2017 Health Equity Report: Uncovering the Root Causes of Health and Towards Racial Equity through Policy & Assessment (2015). Gonzales is the first transgender person to serve in a major leadership position at the Department of Public Health and Wellness.
Gonzales was a Presidential Endowed Scholar at the Graduate College of Social Work of the University of Houston where he earned a Master of Social Work degree. He did his undergraduate work at St. Edward’s University in Austin, Texas where he graduated Summa Cum Laude. Gonzales is currently pursuing a PhD in Public Health Sciences at the University of Louisville School of Public Health and Information Sciences.
“I am delighted and proud that T is now our permanent director at the Center for Health Equity,” said Dr. Sarah Moyer, director of the Department of Public Health and Wellness and the city’s Chief Health Strategist. “T’s leadership skills have been instrumental in restructuring the Department of Public Health and Wellness over the past year to better achieve equity goals. T has a real commitment to this work and the ability to lead the Department of Public Health and Wellness to fulfill its vision of a Louisville where everyone and every community thrives.”
The Department of Public Health and Wellness will host a Birth Equity Town Hall Meeting on Thursday September 5 at 6 p.m. at 400 E. Gray St.
The meeting will consider policy initiatives to close the gap in infant and maternal mortality between the general population and minority communities. The meeting will seek input from community residents and will hear from local and national experts on best-practice policy solutions.
“Louisville has made progress in lowering overall infant mortality rates over the past twenty years,” said Public Health director and the city’s chief health strategist, Dr. Sarah Moyer. “However, there is still a significant gap between the rate at which white and black babies die before their first birthday. African American women are also still far more likely to die in childbirth. The Town Hall Meeting will seek solutions to bring about the day when every child and every community in or city thrives. I encourage people to attend.”
A panel at the Town Hall Meeting will be led by Dr. Edward Ehlinger, Acting Chair of the U.S. Health and Human Service’s Secretary’s Advisory Committee on Infant Mortality. Panelists will include Dr. Carol Brees of the University of Louisville; Dr. Brittany Watkins of Centerstone; Dr. Olugbemisola Obi of U of L Physicians; Dr. Kelly Pryor, a mother; Arthur Lemons, a Healthy Start father; Asia Ware, a Healthy Start mother and Emily Whitsett-Pickett of Mama to Mama. Dr. Moyer will also offer remarks.
While the overall infant mortality rate, the rate at which infants die before their first birthday, has fallen in Louisville from 7.6 to 6.1 per 1000 live births (five year averages of 1995 – 1999 and 2013 – 2017), African American babies still average 5.8 more deaths per 1000 live births than white babies. Also, according to the American Medical Association, African American women in the United States are two to six times more likely to die of complications from pregnancy than white women.
Neighborhood residents in Metro Council Districts 6 and 8 have submitted more than 250 ideas to improve health and wellbeing in their neighborhoods through the Our Money, Our Voice project. Now volunteers are needed to help evaluate those ideas and prepare them for voting.
Launched in August, Our Money, Our Voice is an initiative of the Metro Department of Public Health and Wellness’s Center for Health Equity, and Metro Council President David James (District 6) and Councilman Brandon Coan (District 8). People living in those council districts will decide how $150,000 ($75,000 in each district) will be spent.
“Ideas can be submitted until Nov. 2,” said Council President James. “In our next phase, we need volunteers to serve as community scientists and research the ideas we’ve collected for cost, feasibility, and equity. This work will then lead to those projects all residents can vote on to be funded.”
People interested in volunteering for this phase of the project are asked to attend the Our Money Our Voice Civic Innovation Institute on November 8 from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Louisville Metro Department of Public Health and Wellness headquarters at 400 E. Gray St.
“This is an important step,” said Councilman Coan. “At the Civic Innovation Institute, volunteers will also have an opportunity to build the kind of skills that will help them be able to directly influence how Metro government prioritizes the projects it funds in this pilot and beyond.”
Our Money, Our Voice is the name of Louisville’s participatory budgeting initiative – a way for members of a community to work together to better meet their needs while having a direct say in government decisions. In the process, people often find new ways of interacting with government and with each other to create solutions for all.
Funding for the initiative is coming from $100,000 in capital infrastructure funds ($50,000 from each district) and $50,000 from the Department of Public Health and Wellness.
District 6 neighborhoods participating in Our Money, Our Voice include Algonquin, California, Limerick, Old Louisville, Park Hill, Russell (the section north of Broadway Avenue, south of Plymouth Street, west of 22nd Street, and east of 26th Street), Taylor-Berry, University, and Victory Park.
Participating District 8 neighborhoods include Belknap, Bonnycastle, Cherokee Seneca – Alta Vista, Cherokee Triangle, Deer Park, Gardiner Lane – Upper Highlands, Hawthorne, Hayfield Dundee.
To volunteer, submit ideas or learn more about Our Money, Our Voice visit www.OurMoneyOurVoice.org.
Mayor Greg Fischer has named Sarah S. Moyer M.D., M.P.H., the new Director of the Department of Public Health and Wellness.
“I am confident that as our Chief Health Strategist, Dr. Moyer will provide strong leadership to help realize one of the primary goals of my administration – to make Louisville a much healthier place,” the Mayor said. “Already, she has spearheaded the expansion of Louisville’s Smoke-Free Ordinance to include electronic cigarettes and hookah products, the establishment of Kentucky’s first Syringe Exchange Program, and the national accreditation of the department.”
Dr. Moyer joined the Department of Public Health and Wellness in January 2015 as Medical Director. She also served as the department’s interim health director from January 2015 – April 2016 following the departure of Dr. LaQuandra Nesbitt to assume directorship of the Washington D.C. Department of Health.
As medical director, Dr. Moyer, a board certified family physician, oversaw clinic operations. As the city’s Chief Health Strategist, she works with all sectors of the community to affect policy, systems and environmental changes to make Louisville and its citizens healthier. She currently serves as co-chair of the Louisville Health Advisory Board, a group of leaders from government, business, educational, civic and nonprofit organizations who are working to improve the physical, mental and social well-being of Louisville residents with the goal of increasing the number of healthy days – quality of life – by 20 percent by 2020 and beyond.
“I’m honored by the confidence Mayor Fischer has shown in me by naming me the Director of the Department of Public Health and Wellness,” said Dr. Moyer. “I look forward to working with the fine staff of the department and with all of our community partners to improve the health of our city.”
As Louisville’s Director of Health, Dr. Moyer will also hold an appointment on the faculty of the University of Louisville School of Public Health and Information Sciences (SPHIS).
“Although all schools of public health seek relationships with local and state health departments, the longstanding partnership between LMPHW and SPHIS is unique,” said the school’s dean, Craig Blakely, Ph.D., M.P.H. “Dr. Moyer is a true joint-appointed faculty member in the school, not an honorary adjunct, which is often the case in other communities. We are truly excited that she is taking on the role of health director and look forward to a growing collaborative relationship.”
Dr. Moyer succeeds Dr. Joanne Schulte, who became Louisville’s Director of Health in April, 2016. Dr. Schulte did not renew her contract and returned to the Houston area.
Dr. Moyer earned a Doctor of Medicine from the Temple University School of Medicine In Philadelphia. There she formed Temple’s Emergency Action Corps and worked in sub-acute disaster areas throughout Central and South America after such first-responder agencies as the Red Cross had left. She served in Honduras, El Salvador and Bolivia in 2008, 2009 and 2010.
Dr. Moyer completed her Family Medicine Residency at the Wake Forest School of Medicine. In 2012 she was named “Outstanding Resident” by the North Carolina Academy of Family Physicians. Before entering medical school, Dr. Moyer earned a Master’s in Public Health with honors from Dartmouth. She earned her undergraduate degree from Colorado College, where she majored in physics.
Dr. Moyer is married to Dr. Jed Moyer, a pediatric orthopedic physician with Norton Healthcare. They have three sons — twin three-year-olds and a one-year-old.
