Contra Costa Health Services -
Technical Support Provider on Health Departments and Community Engagement
Organization Overview
Contra Costa Health Services (CCHS) has been working for several years on developing organizational structures and models for collaborating with communities to achieve public health goals. These approaches have been used successfully in our own and other health departments. TCE is supporting an expansion of our efforts to disseminate these models through trainings and in peer exchanges of best practices, allowing us to work with HEAC-funded collaboratives and others around the state. We are interested in continuing our efforts to share our approaches and to learn about and support other health departments and their partners to plan comprehensive public health programs that effectively engage communities.
Technical Support for HEAC Grantees
During the next two years, CCHS will provide consultation, technical assistance and training to health departments and their partners interested in learning how to apply the Spectrum of Prevention and Community Ladder of Participation as frameworks for planning public health interventions. Upon request, we are available to make presentations, conduct trainings and provide technical assistance to health departments and collaborative partners. We can also present our work at statewide or regional conferences or meetings.
The Spectrum of Prevention
Contra Costa County Health Services has developed a training curriculum on the Spectrum of Prevention and how HEAC grantees can apply it to their issues. Also available is a paper on the Spectrum and several interactive exercises that help groups see how they can use this framework to plan and coordinate complex public health programs. An accompanying video provides examples of Spectrum strategies found in most health departments and a case study that illustrates how all of the strategies can be applied to the issue of childhood obesity.
Community Ladder of Participation
Contra Costa County Heath Services has developed a Community Ladder of Participation as another framework that can be used to plan and institutionalize community participation strategies in public health. CCHS staff will be available to provide peer consultation, technical assistance and training to local health departments interested in learning how to apply this framework and other tools and strategies for engaging communities. Using a peer learning approach, training and consultation on this topic emphasizes case study examples and problem-solving discussions to address local challenges.
Topics include:
- Understanding the value and contribution of community engagement;
- Assessing strategies or activities already being used;
- Identifying effective strategies that could be applied to obesity prevention;
- Exploring new approaches;
- Examining the strengths, assets and challenges to undertaking these efforts; and
- Using the Ladder of Community Participation as a framework for dialogue about community engagement challenges. The sessions can be structured either for health departments or for all collaborative partners, depending on the interests of the HEAC grantees.
Tools and Publications
- Healthy Neighborhoods Project: A Guide for Community Building and Mobilizing Around Health (1.3MB PDF, 102pp.) - This guidebook presents a strategy that health departments and other agencies can use for improving community health. It presents the asset-based, community building model of the Healthy Neighborhoods Project and how it has been implemented in Contra Costa County.
Contact Information
Website: www.cchealth.org/
