Sept. 28, 2015: Next Steps: JHM's Commitment to Baltimore City

Dear Colleagues:

In the months since the civil unrest in the spring, Baltimore has begun to heal and rebuild. It has been heartening to see the passion and commitment of the Johns Hopkins Medicine community as so many of you have mobilized in support of these efforts.

As you may recall, over a period of 10 days immediately following the turmoil more than 70 meetings were held in departments across the organization, giving our faculty and staff an opportunity to share their perspectives on these events, and to offer suggestions about how Johns Hopkins Medicine as a whole could contribute to positive change in Baltimore City. You responded with an outpouring of ideas from which a number of themes emerged:  employment, education, health care, youth mentoring and support, trust building, social support enhancements and new community facilities. To move these ideas forward, we formed seven task force groups made up of faculty and staff at all levels from across the organization.

The members of each task force have enthusiastically embraced the charge, meeting throughout the summer to consider these ideas and to identify a small number of projects and initiatives that could address important challenges facing individuals and families in our city.

We would like to thank the task force members for their commitment and the co-chairs of each group for facilitating this work: Community Facilities—Tom Lewis and Ted DeWeese; Education— Anne Seymour and Jude Crino; Employment—Bonnie Windsor and Keith Hill; Social Support Enhancements—Namandje Bumpus and Kostas Lyketos; Trust Building—James Page and Robert Blum; and Youth Mentoring—Daniel Teraguchi and Pablo Celnik. The health care task force is jointly sponsored by the School of Medicine, Bloomberg School of Public Health and School of Nursing.

Their work is almost complete, and soon we will meet to hear their recommendations.  From these, we anticipate selecting, and providing resources for, impactful, sustainable projects that will help to make our community stronger.  We look forward to sharing this with you later in the fall.  

As members of the Baltimore community, we have an important role to play in helping to build a stronger and more vibrant Baltimore, and we are committed to that effort. Thank you for your continued support and partnership.

Sincerely,

Paul B. Rothman
Dean of the Medical Faculty
CEO, Johns Hopkins Medicine

Ronald R. Peterson
President, The Johns Hopkins Hospital and Health System
EVP, Johns Hopkins Medicine