YOUR ASSOCIATION
NEHA NEWS
NEHA Government Aairs Updates Doug Farquhar, JD (dfarquhar@neha.org) Hill Day
the call. Kroeger noted that Senator Barrasso was an advocate for food safety when he served in the Wyoming state legislature. Other members were highly interested in our activities, especially on red tide in Florida, onsite wastewater in Alabama, and the recent train derailment in Ohio. In the context of national politics, these visits are essential to any association promoting their profession. Congress pays atten- tion to those groups that actively promote their profession and supports funding for federal agencies and activities that provide for their profession. Congress needs to hear and know that these e¡orts have an impact on their constituents and communities. While Hill Day is just one day, we are committed to continuing our e¡orts to advocate for the environmental health profession. You can view all our government activities at www.neha.org/advocacy. Support Letters We submitted a support letter to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and HRSA in February 2022. The letter requested HRSA to ensure that the environmental health workforce is included in the Public Health Workforce Loan Repayment Program. This program was authorized by the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2023 as part of the PREVENT Pandemics Act and is essential in ensuring the public health workforce needed for the future. We also requested that the President’s Budget for Fiscal Year 2024 should include at least $100 million for the Public Health Workforce Loan Repayment Program. We also submitted a letter to FDA in January 2023. The letter presented how we can assist FDA with recommendations outlined in the Reagan-Udall Foundation report to improve our nation’s food safety system. We focused on three key recommendations outlined in the report: 1) the U.S. food safety system structure, 2) personnel and workforce, and 3) advocacy for financial support. You can view all our letters and sign-ons at www.neha.org/letters. NEHA Releases 2022 Annual Report
The National Environmental Health Association (NEHA) held our sixth annual Hill Day on Thursday, February 23. The NEHA Board of Directors and several of our members met with 53 members of the U.S. Congress from the House of Representative and Senate, as well as both parties who serve on appropriations committees. These individuals are the decision makers who determine how much funding each federal agency receives. Overall, 14 members of our board participated along with a new member from New Jersey, members from Texas and Califor- nia, and two members from Colorado. Other board members from Alabama, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Ohio, and Oregon also participated. Further, our members from the state aliates in Connecticut and Florida participated to discuss envi- ronmental health with congressional oces from their states. We met with 53 congressional oces, mainly congressional appropriators from the House and Senate (31 Democratic oces and 18 Republican oces). Of the visits, five were from oces in Colorado, five were from Maryland, four were from Alabama, four were from California, and three each were from Connecti- cut, Florida, Georgia, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Oregon, Texas and Wyoming. We had two visits to oces from Kentucky, New Jersey, and Utah. One visit was to the oce of Senator Patty Mur- ray (D-WA). Our meetings focused on appropriations to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and National Center for Environmental Health within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), highlighting the importance of federal funding for food safety and other environmental health objectives to the state and local environmental health profession. Our work is vital as we are the only association that advocates solely for environmental health and the environmental health profession before Congress. During our meetings, we asked Congress to consider the following: • Fund the CDC National Center for Environmental Health at $300 million and the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry at $95 million. • Fund the FDA Federal and State Initiative that supports food safety inspections at $140 million and $35 million for states to purchase equipment to serve healthier meals and improve food safety. • Encourage the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) to include environmental health within the Public Health Workforce Loan Repayment Program. • Share with congressional oces the importance of environmen- tal health to state and local public health agencies. Senator John Barrasso (R-WY) wanted to meet with NEHA Immediate Past-President Roy Kroeger, and was scheduled to join
In March 2022, we released our 2022 Annual Report that summa- rizes the achievements of the orga- nization to build, sustain, and empower an e¡ective environmen- tal health workforce. The report demonstrates our continued com- mitment to being an essential part-
ner and an influential voice in environmental health. In addition to words from NEHA Executive Director Dr. David Dyjack and NEHA President Dr. D. Gary Brown, the report provides a visual picture of our achievements under the following headings: • Inspiring & Providing Professional Development: One of the key ways we work to build and sustain the workforce is through education. Learn about our up-to-date training and educational o¡erings that help environmental health professionals protect their communities and improve health outcomes.
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Volume 85 • Number 9
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