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Summit County staff highlight Healthy Places Index results and launch community health assessment
Summary
Health-department staff presented Utah Healthy Places Index findings showing Summit County ranks among the top counties in the state on multiple indicators, urged broad participation in a county community health assessment and described how the CHA will guide a five-year community health improvement plan.
Kendra, a Summit County health-department staff member, presented the Utah Healthy Places Index (HPI) and said the index shows county-level differences in life expectancy and social determinants of health. "So what is civic health? So community conditions that support health and well-being," Kendra said, and she described the HPIas a composite of 22 core indicators plus hundreds of decision-support layers available down to the census-tract level.
Kendra said Summit County performs strongly on multiple measures that drive life expectancy, including tree canopy where people live, the share of residents with bachelor's degrees, a favorable hardship index and high reports of social and emotional support. She cited one HPI survey statistic: "93.2 percent of adults in the county say they always or usually have the social and emotional support they need." Staff emphasized that many determinants are upstream policy- and community-design questions, not just clinical services.
Nancy, health-department staff leading the community health assessment (CHA) work, said the department has collected 392 surveys so far (379 English, 13 Spanish) and is aiming for 1,000 responses by November. She described a package of outreach materials (posters, postcards, digital media) and asked board members to help distribute materials and identify events where staff can collect surveys. "The data we collect from the community health assessment will shape our programs and services going forward for the next five years," Nancy said.
Staff noted HPI version updates added environmental measures such as air quality, which changed some Southern Utah counties' rankings, and reminded the board the HPI can be used to examine disparities at the census-tract level. The presentation closed with an explicit request that board members promote the CHA in their networks and community offices.
The health department said the CHA results will inform a community health improvement plan to be presented next year, and staff pledged to provide the board with an update after the county budget-committee meeting and a fuller report when the CHA is complete.
