The Health and Wellness Cluster collaborated with California Health Data team in a new statewide project funded by the California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF)’s Free the Data initiative. The goal behind this initiative is to bring together local communities with California’s health data. In March, there was an event with over 30 people in attendance to discuss how health data can be used to make transformative decisions regarding people’s lives. As a development, CHCF also partnered with California Health Department to help facilitate discussions across the state to discuss “Let’s Get Healthy California” and the “Open Data Portal.” The purpose is to officials from the academic, public and private sectors can discuss possible collaborations.

In December 2015, Fresno adopted the Citywide Development Code. Health officials from the public and private sectors were brought together in this policy’s creation to create restrictions on storefront window and outdoor advertising. The policy’s purpose is to protect the health, safety, and welfare of Fresno residents.

In May 2016, the City and Partnerships to Improve Community Health Program hosted a joint press conference to highlight this important issue and the new policy. At the news conference, spokespersons from the City of Fresno, the Fresno County Department of Public Health, Youth Leadership Institute and Youth Leaders were present to conduct interviews and show support for the new code.

Accountable Communities for Health (ACHs) seeks to explicitly bring together key sectors and partners—from the community to the health care delivery system—in order to collectively advance a common health goal. One of these programs is the California Accountable Communities for Health Initiative (CACHI). CACHI was designed to implement a new population health model that would link together health care systems, community resources and social services with primary prevention approaches in a given geographic area to address a particular health need, such as chronic disease, on a communitywide basis.

The Fresno Community Health Improvement Partnership (FCHIP) submitted an application for infrastructure funding through the California Accountable Communities for Health Initiative (CACHI). CACHI is a three-year initiative that supports the development of Accountable Communities for Health (ACHs), collaborative organizations like FCHIP. Status of the application is still pending.

The Fresno Community Health Improvement Partnership (FCHIP) is working towards identifying a solution to increase awareness in 18-35 age groups to visit doctors more frequently. This age group does not have a good track record when it comes to health checkups which can lead to undiscovered health issues later in life. FCHIP is partnering with OCED to research grant opportunities and create awareness in the rural communities. More meetings and activities are planned for the fourth quarter to address this issue.