Dear Minnesota Public Health Association member –

Thank you for your interest in the MPHA. If you are a new or renewing member, we appreciate your endorsement of our work!  There is lots going on with the organization right now and this certainly looks to continue.

We spent several months in early 2009 creating a new strategic plan with the goals being: 1) to grow the membership and improve member services, 2) to improve our governance and management structures, and 3) to reach out to other organizations and the public. The Minnesota Healthy Communities Act is an aggressive first step relating to this latter goal. The act would return tobacco settlement monies to disease prevention and health promotion and give communities new tools to get involved in protecting their own health.

We are receiving excellent management services from LPaC (formerly Halleland Health Consulting) and are very grateful for their leadership.  The Governing Council and committees are meeting regularly and are being much better coordinated.

I encourage you to be on the lookout for new members. Our membership is our strength and our core.  If we each brought in one new member this year, the membership would double (that’s easy math).  It’s easy to join by going to the brand-new MPHA website and joining: www.mpha.net. For those averse to on-line payments, you can download a membership form from the same site.  Let’s go for it. There are lots of potential members out there – I’m sure that we see them every day. If you have any questions at all about your MPHA membership, don't hesitate to email our membership  committee at: membership@mpha.net.

Take care and I hope to see you soon!

Ken Bence, 2010-2011 MPHA President