SALISBURY — A steering committee formed to conduct a community health needs assessment met for the first time last week and featured multiple local figures from various organizations and entities.

The community health needs assessment is a quadrennial undertaking required by the state to compile comprehensive public health data from a county. The process establishes priority objectives derived from public health concerns and gives officials directional guidance for how to address those issues that rise to the top.

Several of the steering committee members gathered at St. John’s Lutheran Church on Friday, Dec. 13, for introductions during a launch meeting.

“What a way to kick off on this auspicious day,” Rowan County Health Director Alyssa Harris quirked.

In addressing the group, Harris broke down the significance of the community health needs assessment process.

“It is a journey,” she said. “I love this process because it brings together people who are interested or are part of the conversations in what is going on in our community.

“This is my third community health needs assessment process in Rowan County. Each time, it really brings great conversation to the surface. It highlights data and it allows us to all get on the same page for where we want to see Rowan County move in the next three years.”

Harris said that with community health efforts, it’s important to temper expectations about what is realistic and how soon the fruits of those labors will be visible.

“We recognize that things are not going to be resolved in three years,” Harris said. “It really is sort of a marking point of if there is work that needs to start. Is there work that needs to continue?”

This latest community health needs assessment promises to at least be more interactive that the last time that it was conducted, which occurred in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic forcing meetings to be held remotely.

“It was definitely condensed with a lot of presentations over Zoom,” Harris said. “We had great information, but having the chance to be in person and come together and have our presenters have robust conversations is really going to change the work on how this process goes.”

During the years in between the community health needs assessments, Harris said that the health department is required to put out a state of the county health report which provides information like life expectancy and emerging issues as well as the county’s progress towards addressing those issues. Those benchmarks help to hold public health officials accountable for how those highlighted issues are addressed.

“We said obesity is an issue in this community, well what have you done,” Harris offered as an example of how those benchmarks look.

Ultimately, progress towards a healthier Rowan County will take a unified approach.

“We are not the only ones responsible for doing the work,” Harris said. “We know that we can only affect so much as a health department. Only about 20 percent of your health is impacted by clinical care. Eighty percent is everything else in the community.

“It really takes all of us around the table to move the needle and make a healthier community.”

As the project moves forward, the steering committee will meet once a month. In January, the committee will explore areas like food access, employment, education and crime, with presentations expected from local stakeholders in those areas. That meeting is categorized as “social and economic conditions.”

February’s meeting which focuses on health behaviors and health outcomes will spotlight primary care, chronic disease, dental and mental health. Then in March, the committee will shift gears to “physical environment,” exploring such topics as substance use, environmental health factors, housing and transportation.

Harris said the early start to a 2025 assessment is required due to the scope of the project.

“This takes a really long time,” Harris said.

This document will actually come out in March of 2026.

“At the end of the day, you all will be deciding along with other community partners because you will listen to these presentations, you will be a part of this journey, and you will be deciding what our focus areas are,” Harris said.

Harris indicated that having that directional fortitude allows those organizations involved to go after grants, redirect funding and to advocate to local philanthropic agencies to address priority issues.

Part of this process will involve gathering community input. There are 147,067 people in Rowan County scattered across 511 square miles. The needs of someone living in a rural part of the county could very well differ from the needs of someone living in densely populated Salisbury.

Addressing the gaps in those needs and painting a comprehensive picture of the county takes time, but the steering committee is in it for the long haul.