"HIre. Buy. Live Newark" Created to Bolster City of Newark

Michellene Davis, Executive VP & Chief Corporate Affairs Officer, RWJBarnabas Health, talks about "Hire. Buy. Live. Newark," a partnership between the city’s business community, the City of Newark, higher education, medical institutions, clergy, philanthropic organizations and workforce development programs to reduce poverty and unemployment and strengthen the city’s economy. Michellene also addresses concerns that many in the African American community have about organ/tissue donation despite the great need among them for transplants, and why registration is so important.

11/11/2017 #121

 

 

 

 

Excerpt:

"Hi, welcome to State of Affairs. I'm Steve Adubato, coming to you, more importantly, from the Agnes Varis NJTV Studio in Brick City, that's Newark, New Jersey. We're pleased to welcome Michellene Davis, Executive Vice President and Chief Corporate Affairs Officer, RWJBarnabas Health. How you doing? I'm well. How are you? Good. The first time in the studio, right? It's gorgeous. Isn't it? It is. Well, Michellene is also the president of Executive Women of New Jersey, and to fully disclose, your organization, RWJBarnabas Health, is a big supporter of public broadcasting. Absolutely. Now that we have that out of the way, let's talk about Newark. We are in Brick City, we're in Newark, there was an announcement with you, Barry Ostrowsky, the CEO of the organization, Ras Baraka, the mayor of Newark, about an initiative called Hire. Buy. Live. Newark. Go. Hire. Buy. Live. Newark is really an incredibly exciting initiative. We are proud to be a part of it. One of the core anchor organizations that came together with the mayor, nearly two years ago actually Steve, and began talking about what can we do? How can we utilize our presence in the city in order to help lift the local economy? Right? To ensure that we are, yes, treating patients within the walls of our hospital, but then doing more than that. Going outside of those walls and utilizing our place-based presence to lift the community as we climb, right? How so? So that means that we pay special attention, deliberate attention, to how we effectuate our operations on a daily basis. So who is it that we're hiring? And who is it from whom we are buying? And how do we ensure that we are doing this with a laser focused responsibility to ensure that we are hiring individuals from the surrounding community in the location where we are placed? Now to be fair, I will tell you that, as an anchor institution, one that... What does that mean, by the way? So anchor institutions are interesting entities which, unlike perhaps, oh I don't know, a local bank branch, are not there for today, and possibly gone within a year or two. They don't easily pick up and just move. We, as you know, own and operate Newark Beth Israel Medical Center on Lyons Avenue, in the beautiful South Ward of Newark. That's right. It has been there for approximately a 119-120 years, right..."