Joint Leadership Team

Transforming the public health system in Minnesota 

This happens through: 

Representative membership

• This team is structured to bring together key leaders of Minnesota’s governmental public health system—state health officials (MDH), local health directors (LPHA), and locally-elected community health board officials (SCHSAC).
• Each organization identifies its own representatives to sit on the Joint Leadership Team.
• The team is exploring what it looks like to increase work with Tribal Nations and Tribal health directors.

Shared leadership

• Changing Minnesota’s governmental public health system requires shared leadership.
• Joint Leadership Team members bring the perspectives of their members, and champion and lead change in their sector.

Consistent dialogue and trust-building

• The team operates in twice-monthly meetings, with asynchronous communication between meetings.

Outside the Joint Leadership Team, different sectors of the public health system are builders and project managers of specific pieces of work that make the Joint Leadership Team vision a reality. 

Roadmap: Where we've been, where we're going

This roadmap is a tool to help everyone working to transform the public health system move in the same direction, even when working across different paths and on different timelines. It can help orient everyone involved to notice where action is happening around them, the part they could or should play, how they can adapt to changes, and where opportunities or challenges are apparent. 

Several activities have happened or are happening to pave the path for action. This roadmap lays out pathways and strategies to build on these activities, and milestones that have already happened.

The Joint Leadership Team will update this roadmap periodically as different sectors of the public health system carry out work and as the social and policy landscapes surrounding the system change. 

Download: Roadmap Toward a Seamless, Responsive, Publicly-Supported Public Health System (PDF)

Local Public Health Association (LPHA)

• Amy Westbrook (St. Louis), 2025 LPHA Chair
• Sara Hollie (Hennepin), LPHA Chair-Elect
• Nick Kelley (Bloomington), Immediate Past LPHA Chair
• Kari Oldfield-Tabbert, LPHA Director
• More information: LPHA

Minnesota Department of Health (MDH)

• Brooke Cunningham, Commissioner of Health
• Mel Gresczyk, Assistant Commissioner, Health Operations Bureau
• Chelsie Huntley, Director, Public Health Strategy and Partnership Division
• Kim Milbrath, Section Manager, Center for Public Health Practice
• Kris Rhodes, Director, Office of American Indian Health; Interim Assistant Commissioner, Health Equity Bureau
• Halkeno Tura, Assistant Commissioner, Health Improvement Bureau
• More information: About MDH

State Community Health Services Advisory Committee (SCHSAC)

• De Malterer (Le Sueur-Waseca), 2025-2026 SCHSAC Chair
• Laurie Halverson (Dakota County), SCHSAC Chair-Elect
• Tarryl Clark (Stearns), Immediate Past SCHSAC Chair
• More information: SCHSAC

Contact the Joint Leadership Team

Please direct any questions or feedback to a Joint Leadership Team representative from your specific sector, above, due to the collaborative nature of transforming Minnesota's public health system.