“We have collectively built a public health machine,” Dr. Lee Smith said Thursday to open his final report as executive director of the Monongalia County Health Department.
And now, more than 20 months into the public health baptism by fire known as COVID-19, it’s time for some retooling.
Smith, who spent the last seven years as both the executive director and the county’s health officer, will relinquish the administrative functions of the director role at year’s end to focus on clinical matters, research and education as MCHD’s medical director.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Smith told the board of health, explaining his new role will be on par with other full-time health officers in the state, including Dr. Michael Killkenny at the Cabell-Huntington Health Department and Dr. Sherry Young with the Kanawha-Charleston Health Department.
Taking up those administrative functions will be Anthony DeFelice, who will take over as executive director exactly one year after joining MCHD as its chief financial officer. In July, Devan Smith was hired as MCHD’s new chief financial officer and DeFelice became the organization’s deputy director.
The changes have been made necessary by growth, which was made necessary by COVID-19.
Since 2019, the Monongalia County Health Department has expanded from 57 employees to 107 employees. Those numbers don’t include on-site contractors, West Virginia National Guard personnel and students from the WVU School of Nursing.
In roughly that same span, the health department has taken on two additional facilities beyond its main office at 453 Van Voorhis and WIC building, at 1000 Elmer Prince Drive.
The department’s Threat Preparedness operations are now based in the old DHHR Northern Operations building, on the Morgantown Municipal Airport campus.
Later this month, MCHD’s Environmental Services wing will move into a building at the Airport Business Park, off Hartman Run Road.
Smith said the challenges posed by COVID-19 have created a health department capable of adapting to meet the demands of a global health crisis while continuing to meet all the other public health needs of the community.
“We have, at the Mon County Health Department, kind of found our stride,” Smith said. “It’s caused us to grow and it’s caused us to accept wholeheartedly the mission of public health.”
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