Blue Ridge Health District presents Map to Health findings; Fifeville highlighted as priority area

Ryan McKay, director of the Blue Ridge Health District, and Jen Fleisher, the district’s community health improvement program officer, briefed the Charlottesville City Council at a work session on the district’s current community health assessment and improvement planning process, known locally as Map to Health.

The presentation summarized an 18-month assessment that collected 267 in-person interviews, about 640 online survey responses and input from roughly 85 agencies. Fleisher said the process uses a “mobilizing for action through planning and partnerships” model and that “we call it locally a CHA, a community health assessment,” a requirement nonprofit hospitals complete to maintain IRS tax-exempt status.

The nut graf: the assessment identified priorities the steering committee is now refining; the district will publish the report in September and support implementation grants that begin in 2026 so community partners can carry out locally targeted interventions.

McKay said the Map to Health process has run in the Blue Ridge district since 2009 and has been used to identify upstream programs and staff positions — for example, a tobacco cessation specialist, a maternal-child health coordinator and a…