Dear Colleagues:

First, the big news. We have more members today than ever before in Section history.  As of August 2007, Community Health Planning and Policy Development was 2,005 members strong.  This is clearly the result of a team effort across our four major committees:  Membership, Program, Policy and Resolutions, and Students.

We entered the year facing a range of challenges and are making good progress on all fronts. Among our accomplishments:

• Finalized the member manual, streamlining functions and committees and expanding leadership opportunities by adding co-chairs to the Membership and Program Committees.
• Released an on-line survey to help the Planning and Policy Dialogues Session Work Group finalize its plans for valuable member interaction in between APHA Annual Meetings. 
• Impacted policy at the national level by assisting with the soon-to-be adopted Uniform Emergency Volunteer Health Practitioner Act model state law language. 
• Had a competitive field for the Governing Council positions .
• Made some fundamental structural changes in how we budget, program and operate.

Section Council and Governing Council members certainly had their "shoulder to the wheel" this year in order to achieve these successes.  However, we are now entering a new season, and there are three major challenges before us.

First, Section Council will be charged this year with determining the ways in which we can create maximum value for members and take advantage of the enormous social and intellectual capital of our membership.  To this end, we will undergo a visioning and work plan process at the business meetings of the Annual Meeting this fall. Formal committee reports will be made available online in lieu of taking valuable face-to-face time. In order to make time for visioning and to engage as many members as possible, we will not entertain candidates during our meeting times. Instead, we will conduct one or two audio-conference calls for candidates for APHA Executive Board and officers of the organization to present their qualifications and field questions.  These two calls will be open to all members. Please check the Section’s Web page for candidate audio-conference call details.

Second, we need to assess how we partner and think strategically about ways in which we should collaborate with other sections and organizations outside of APHA.

Third, we need to continue moving forward with being more pro-active in advancing policy.  The Planning and Policy Dialogues Sessions should help us in this regard.

We seem to do well when taking on three challenges a year.  I believe 2007-2008 will be a great year for our section.

As a last note, I was chair of the Inter-Sectional Council Nominations Committee this year and am pleased to announce that our immediate past chair, Tom Piper, made the recommended slate for ISC Steering Committee. Tom has the full support of CHPPD. We wish him well in the election.

Yours in service,

Sue Myers