Speaker 1: 0:00

Do you think it's possible? Can the region become the healthiest in America by 2033?

Speaker 2: 0:03

Yeah, there is a lot of work now going on with the Community Foundation, the Chamber Plan, RVA, United Way to work on a regional framework. I'm excited about that because that brings us all like rolling in the same direction. I need to see results in two or three years. That's how we forever figure out how to become the healthiest place in America.

Speaker 1: 0:25

Good morning and welcome to America's Healthiest City. On ESPN Richmond 106.1, part of the Mike King Biz Media Network, you can catch us each week here on Thursday at 6 am. You can also catch us on wherever you get your podcasts and on socials. We air this live in all those places. Today we are in the studio with Reggie Gordon, the CEO of the Richmond Memorial Health Foundation, super excited about this interview because the Richmond Memorial Health Foundation has had a longstanding history in our community and they do a lot of really great work, fund a lot of really great work. But before we get started, america's Healthiest City is a 10-year community partnership to make all of Richmond and the entire region the healthiest in America by 2033. Check out our ideas board at americashealthiestcitycom to see what others have submitted and leave your ideas behind as well. We're going to go ahead and get into this interview, reggie. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Speaker 1: 1:09

I appreciate this Glad to be here. I start this show out with everybody with the same question Are you a native to Richmond or did you move here? And if so, what made you come?

Speaker 2: 1:17

I'm a native. Okay, I grew up Well. I moved here with my family when I was seven, so I consider that native, and I went to Richmond Public Schools and I grew up on Northside and I always tell folks I had an idyllic childhood here in Richmond. So that's one reason I'm connected now, because I want other kids to have what I had growing up in this city.

Speaker 1: 1:39

Well, you're not the first person I've spoken to in the community who is a native and has really devoted their life to serving the community. So kudos to you for making that decision, and I want to kind of talk about that trajectory. So I know that prior to your role you were working for the city of Richmond and human services. Tell me a little bit about that and what preceded that.

Speaker 2: 2:02

Sure, okay, well, I'll give you my whole journey to today. Let's do it All right. So I grew up here, went off to college, went to law school and when I was in law school I had a thought that I wanted to give back to the community as opposed to going to a law firm. So, as I was graduating with the Howard Law School and I was graduating and went to a career day fair and I walked in and the first table I saw was for Central Virginia Legal Aid and I went up to them and started talking to them and I got hired as a young attorney. That was in Emporia, virginia, so I was there for like a year. But when I was there, I understood on a really deep level about the challenges that are being faced by so many people, not only in rural communities but in cities as well Illiteracy, fear of authority and just how to navigate life. So that propelled me forward. I never forgot that because I went here. I am a lawyer but I'm helping people figure out how to pay their light bills. They thought they were going to go to jail and I was like, no, this says just pay your bill and you'll be okay. That was a real eye-opening experience for me which led from that to other jobs.

Speaker 2: 3:17

I was a lawyer in DC for a while. After doing that, for seven years I went you know what I want to start over come back home to Richmond and try to make good on that commitment to change my community. So I've had great jobs here, working on homelessness. I worked with the Williamburg Community House, which was a poverty prevention nonprofit. I went back to the Red Cross as the CEO for the state for disaster relief and then went to the city for community wealth building that project and initiative, human services with the city and now at the foundation. So I've seen it all from the nonprofit level, local government, as well as serving on boards too, and you gave up the high paying DC lawyer job.

Speaker 1: 4:00

I gave up the high paying.

Speaker 2: 4:01

Yes, yes, but that was okay, because I felt trapped by that. For a while I was like I don't want to. I've gone to school, I spent years getting ready for this law career, but I felt unfulfilled and so and the money was holding me back I could make that leap and start over Going from. I took an 80% cut in pay to come back home and work in nonprofits, but it's been great.

Speaker 1: 4:31

So you learned a lesson early on, and I come from a family of little means and there's things I was talking to somebody yesterday about how we should be teaching kids in school how to respond to requests for proposal, and that has nothing to do with the conversation, but in some sense I didn't learn that until way later in life. I was a business owner and I was just never, you know, applying for these opportunities because I don't know how to do that or I'm going to lose it. And it seems to me, like you learn that people who are under-resourced they're not just under-resourced when it comes to money, but the knowledge on how to navigate the system. Wealthy people teach their kids these things Not everybody does that?

Speaker 2: 5:06

Yep, 100%, if I could just underscore, or just, I'm a disciple for that statement because money and a mentor. You need a mentor to navigate life. There are so many resources, so many programs, so many people who want to help. But if you are on your own, just talking to people in your own circle who might be uninformed through no fault of their own, then you miss out opportunities for education or healthcare just put on the whole list of social determinants of health. So you got to have some kind of community and network that will open doors for you. And I keep preaching that to folks and I know it's scary to talk to someone who doesn't live in your neighborhood or isn't in your faith community or doesn't have the same political views whatever. But in order for us to find these ways to keep everyone moving up, we need to bring down those barriers and just communicate, because that might be the literal difference between life and death for someone.

Speaker 1: 6:15

So you're helping folks navigate challenges. You yourself chose to enter a career path that was no doubt challenging. You worked for City Hall. If you read the RTD, you know they get a pretty bad rap over there. Let's give you a chance to correct the record. What's it like to work?

Speaker 2: 6:24

in the city.

Speaker 1: 6:25

And tell me about your time.

Speaker 2: 6:27

So when I went to work for the city, I was the second director of the Office of Community Wealth and I walked into a program and people who were already fully engaged in trying to find pathways for economic mobility for people in the most vulnerable situations in Richmond. This is an innovative office.

Speaker 2: 6:51

It was an innovative office, the first one in the country. So then I'm like, wow, richmond is at the top of the list. So other folks from other cities would come to Richmond while I was there to take notes about how they could follow our path, because we're doing something that hadn't been done before, which is a holistic approach, from education to transportation, to you name it, anything that's been a barrier for people try to understand how to help that individual and, in turn, their families move forward. So what I saw in City Hall were a bunch of innovative people who were totally committed to making life better for all.

Speaker 2: 7:32

Now, sitting around the table even the mayor's table and hearing people bounce ideas, shed tears, celebrate successes and pumping each other up to keep moving forward, you leave the meeting. Then you read the newspaper or hear something about how a bunch of idiots and incompetent people are running the city, like what I just talked to those. These are some brilliant folks. So I was really, um, I had this sort of like wow, this is how do you fix this? But I don't think it can be fixed, because once some a narrative sets in, there's almost nothing you can do to convince people that we're all humans trying to do the best job we can. If someone doesn't like you or has a difference of opinion, that's going to get a lot of airtime and you just have to. What we did internally was just ignore it. Just keep moving forward. We're doing the right work, we're doing good work. That's how you succeed.

Speaker 1: 8:26

Well, I will say that a big motivation for this show comes from my own time in leadership Metro Richmond and hearing rumblings from Richmonders that Richmond can't move past its past and it can't do big things and it's just stuck. And I didn't see that and I knew that there was a different narrative there, and so I think for us, what we're hoping to do is for those people who are maybe sitting at home on the couch thinking nobody else is out there doing anything. Let's show them that there are people out here who are making things happen, doing good work and dedicating their whole life, quite frankly, to making things better.

Speaker 2: 8:59

I'm glad you're doing this. You're doing this. I recall that in city meetings or looking at the city council, people who come up to talk about what's wrong is usually from a very narrow vision. Like there's a pothole on my street, there are some leaves that are in my way. Meanwhile we're thinking there are thousands of people in our community who need pathways to economic upper mobility.

Speaker 2: 9:28

But the sobering fact was that's not what people care about. They care about the pothole on their street. So if that pothole doesn't get fixed, it translates into I don't trust the city to do big things. And we're like isn't the Office of Community Wealth Building bigger than the pothole on your street? The answer is usually no. So I've had a friend that said you know? He said if I were running for mayor I would just spend a year fixing potholes, not do anything else. Because once that's done people will say oh, this city is great, but it's like it's so weird. But I think that's true. It's hard to look at your neighbor's challenges and put money, time and effort into them if you have a pothole on your block.

Speaker 1: 10:17

Well, I talk about this with other folks because challenges have complex solutions. It's not easy to solve these things, and solutions can often be engineered to solve a couple of different problems. And I think to myself how many potholes could we fix if we lifted that bottom 15% of people in our community out of poverty so that they're contributing tax dollars, you know, whether it be through sales taxes or property taxes or whatever we don't think that way, we don't think that way, we don't think that way.

Speaker 1: 10:46

Right, we're the folks who I was telling somebody the other day. I said we respond to natural disasters. You know, like we knew it was going to happen, why are we waiting until it happens to respond? They said we actually probably have the best disaster response in the world and sometimes you just have to wait for it to happen. You don't know what you need to do. I've been down that road to Red Cross.

Speaker 2: 11:03

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 11:04

Yeah, well, let's take a little break and we'll come back and we'll talk more about the Richmond Memorial Health Foundation. Okay, sure, thank you for listening to America's Healthiest City on Mike King Biz Radio Network.

Speaker 3: 11:19

When we asked ourselves what could we do to stop the tide of plastic bottled water. We never thought we'd start a water brand, but an idea grew and Richmond Water was born. Now we're replacing single-use plastic on the shelf with collectible, refillable aluminum bottles of water and we're installing refill stations throughout RVA, launching a movement to refill. It's your turn to make a splash. Find your bottle of Richmond Water or add refill stations to your next event at drinkrichmondwatercom. That's kind of cool.

Speaker 1: 11:50

Welcome back to America's Healthiest City. I am in the studio today with Reggie Gordon, the CEO of the Richmond Memorial Health Foundation. We just got a great download on Reggie's past and the work he's done in the city. We want to talk a little bit more about the Richmond Memorial Health Foundation, because not everybody knows it exists. We'd like to think everybody does, but certainly folks that know that it exists may not know what it does, and so I'll give you a chance to tell us a little bit more about that Sure, what we need to know.

Speaker 2: 12:16

Okay, the Richmond Memorial Health Foundation is a health legacy foundation. What I mean by that is for folks who are from Richmond. There was a hospital here in Richmond called the Richmond Memorial Hospital. That closed in the late 90s but as it was closing, the corpus of funds that was left in reserves formed the basis for our foundation. So over time we know that's been invested over and over again and so now we you know it varies based on the markets but we have like maybe $110 million and because we are a private foundation, we have to disperse at least 5% of that every year. So that ends up a board of 17 people community leaders who have a heart and a passion for equity, and our emphasis now is on racial and health equity. Our mission is to foster a healthy and equitable Richmond region. So as a foundation we receive grant applications and then we evaluate them to see if they match or align with our mission, and then we then have the board to decide to approve, to give money to those 501c3 organizations. And we have a strategic framework now which is sort of new.

Speaker 2: 13:35

We listened to the community over the past several years to figure out how can we be more effective and impactful as a foundation and what we heard was giving dollars on a multi-year basis, as opposed to you apply for a grant, you get some money for a year, then you come back and apply the next year.

Speaker 2: 13:57

We decided to listen to the folks who told us can you just have multi-year funding? So we do have general operating support now for like about 20 entities who are lined up with how we see racial and health equity. So we'll fund them for three years, maybe even more, and we also are hoping to support and grow Black and Brown-led organizations, build their capacity to make sure that they can provide effective, transformative programming to those with whom they have the most proximity in the community, and community engagement is key. We're in this together and I think our foundation and others in Richmond too have moved away from. We said hi and we. You know you beg for dollars and we give you something. No, it's really a partnership where we listen to what's going on and how we can be instrumental in forever changing the trajectory of folks' lives, whether that's from a health perspective or economics.

Speaker 1: 14:54

So let's maybe get a little bit tangible on this. Can you give an example or two of successful projects that you guys have funded that folks in the community might be familiar with?

Speaker 2: 15:04

Girls for a change. So at first blush you might say, well, why would a rich Memorial Health Foundation fund an organization that serves black girls? Well, because if we're going to break intergenerational poverty or help people open new doors about how to find pathways to success, whether it's with employment or just how to navigate the systems that I talked about earlier those organizations need to be solid and have an expectation that the funders will be there to help them, staff the group the right way and develop strategies that will communicate to success for the girls. And proud to say that Girls for Change has done just that. You might have heard they have a documentary that's coming out soon It'll be out in Richmond this week which shows a program that the girls thought of to have a dance with their fathers, who, some of them, have been incarcerated.

Speaker 2: 16:09

So part of this is getting to. How do you change the narrative? What can we do as a community to foster that sense of belonging and that organizations that are looking at the policies and the barriers need to come down so that we can, you know, decrease the poverty rate, increase hope. That's what we want to fund. So that's, that's one example.

Speaker 1: 16:33

I love that, because we had Angela Patton in the studio the day before the news broke about Daughters, so we actually got her to talk about it, recording for air the air the day after, and I think that's just such a good example, because there are a lot of people that are working together to make things like that happen, and I can't help but to think that it's an award-winning documentary and Kerry Washington's involved with it. That's a really really big deal, so I'm glad you brought that up.

Speaker 2: 16:58

And we also are funding policy advocacy groups too, because what usually gets attention are organizations that are providing a service to people on the ground. Meanwhile we've been had that's our new emphasis who's working with the General Assembly or either local officials to sort of change the change or bring down the, the prop, the barriers that have caused people to be stuck. So we're funding those groups too.

Speaker 1: 17:29

That's great. That's great. I know that there's a lot of policy changes happening these days, as we have more data and sort of evidence-based solutions coming from other places, but also data that we gather here in Virginia. So that's great, that's great. Well, what else? What else do people need to know? I mean, are people still giving to the Richmond Memorial Health Foundation, you know, as bequests or any other kind of gifts Okay?

Speaker 2: 17:51

well, here's the good news for us we don't no one. We already have our money when the hospital closed. That corpus of money, like I mentioned, it grows. It sort of turns on how the stock market is going, but we don't need to ask anyone for money. And so that puts us in a unique position to support groups that might feel themselves vulnerable if political attitudes change, things like Planned Parenthood or organizations in the Commonwealth that might have to watch how they present themselves for fear of losing support. Well, if they match our mission and our trustees agree, we will continue to fund them. So that's the difference of having a private foundation that doesn't get any public dollars.

Speaker 1: 18:39

Yeah, Well, that's informative. I never really know how foundations work. Yeah, they're different. Have a lot of money and just give it out to the folks. Well, we're going to take another quick break and when we come back I want to focus the conversation a little bit more broadly on the region and what ideas we might be able to inject into the system to make things better. All right, We'll be right back.

Speaker 3: 19:03

You're listening to America's Healthiest City on Mike King Biz Radio Network on ESPN Richmond 106.1 and Choice 105.3.

Speaker 1: 19:11

Welcome back to America's Healthiest City. I'm your host, will Melton, and today in the studio we have Reggie Gordon, the CEO of the Richmond Memorial Health Foundation. If you're new to this program, please go hop over to americashealthCitycom to find all of our social links and links to our podcast. We drop the show each Thursday at 6 am and you can catch it where you listen to podcasts on YouTube, on LinkedIn Live, as well as on ESPN Richmond 106.1 and ESPNRichmondcom. Please follow us, subscribe to our channels and catch short clips and full episodes of this show each week.

Speaker 1: 19:43

Reggie, thanks for coming into the studio. I've really enjoyed this conversation. You're keeping me on my toes here. I you know our ideas board on our website is one of the ways that we inspire Richmond, and I want to give you an opportunity to perhaps share an idea or two, small or large, that folks might decide to subscribe to or take up as a way to contribute to our community health. And I will just say that you know we look at the social determinants a lot. So, yeah, there's a lot of alignment there.

Speaker 2: 20:10

Okay, I've been around a while and I do have an idea. You know, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of folks, whether they're affected to a nonprofit, a faith community, etc. Who want to do the right thing. That is good. The challenge is we need to work in concert. Now that's a very difficult thing. So I'm always I wish, I hope, dream there's somebody really smart out there that can help us figure out how to have a front door to the system, to the system. Because, as we talked about this earlier, if you're on your own struggling with trying to pay your bills, trying to navigate some challenges with your kid, trying to get a better paying job, the list goes on healthcare challenge on, and on On your own, you're trying to do research to figure out how to make ends meet or find someone that can help you.

Speaker 2: 21:09

There are folks in town who are skilled with the full continuum of programs and services or at least know how to find out what programs and services are available. So imagine a day in a region that's not we're not New York, not San Francisco, this is Richmond, medium-sized city and region you call up, walk in, talk to someone and say here's everything about my life, here's how much money I make here's who lives in my household. Here's the challenges I'm facing. I want to get to this point as soon as I can. Tell me what to do and that person just sits down with you and charts out a plan based on the existing programs, agencies, et cetera, enrichment, even public benefits.

Speaker 2: 21:55

There's probably a way I know there is to say here are public benefits that you haven't taken advantage of because you didn't know. Maybe there's something that you can get to help with home repair that you didn't know. So I think if we could just weave all of the good things together, that would probably catapult people to another level of stability and get them out of some stressful situations. But that's that's. That's a big one, yeah, but it's not too big for us.

Speaker 2: 22:21

You know it's just it's because we all are in our own areas doing great work but not really talking to each other.

Speaker 1: 22:28

Well, I have to tell you about my idea for a bank whose job it is to do that. I personally think that the bank's job is to help us build wealth, not just a place to store money. I love that. We'll talk about it. I love that. Something else that we look for from our guests, because we never know who is out there making the good things happen. We have some sense of folks, but we always look for referrals and recommendations for other people in the community that we might go to, to speak to and kind of learn things from, so that we can inject even more ideas into this program. So I'll give you some time to think about that. If you have another idea or two you want to inject into our ideas board, or if you just have a vision for the future of Richmond. I think you've been so connected to the mission that we have with this show and with this initiative. Maybe the question I have for you is do you think it's possible? Can the region become the healthiest in America by 2033?

Speaker 2: 23:21

Yeah, yeah, there is a lot of work now going on with the community foundation, the chamber Plan, rva, united Way to work on a regional framework. I'm excited about that because that brings us all like rowing in the same direction with a long-term strategy and, as long as we're not faint of heart to say I need to see results in two or three years. That's how we forever figure out how to become the healthiest place in America, because we know each other. We're three degrees of separation with everyone in town and just through LMR there are all these networks that if we had the plan, we could find how we plug into the ultimate plan. That's something I think will be really key and we can get that done sooner rather than later.

Speaker 1: 24:10

Well, I'm excited about that. I've been keyed in on that and I know that there's some details to emerge for the community coming up soon. So, yeah, well, what else? I mean, what else is on the horizon?

Speaker 2: 24:21

There are two things that I don't know, if people know about. In the meantime, if you want to help a neighbor who is struggling and they have a need like getting a car fixed or some kind of help bill, there's the giving wall. You heard of that. Yep, okay, which is great that's Becky, lakin that's a homegrown solution as well as the friend.

Speaker 2: 24:46

You know what? The friend, the best friend movement, yeah, yeah, that's, that's just, but that's just building the sense of community. And so, as we are trying to find solutions, I think the most effective way to find solutions is to get to know the other, because if you think the person who lives across town, who seems to be financially struggling, if there's something wrong with that person, it's because you haven't talked to that person. They probably had this, you know, they have children, they have issues, they have ups and downs.

Speaker 2: 25:16

And I think if we begin to humanize people who are rich, middle class or low wealth and just say what's the common denominator? You know, love, safety, security. And then when there are policies that are presented before city council or the state, you can say well, a friend of mine lives in that neighborhood, or a friend of mine is having some trouble with transportation, or a friend of mine is having trouble with health care, you know, and so you might be a better advocate if you change that person from the other to a friend. That's why your friend is key.

Speaker 1: 25:49

Yeah, we had the folks from One Small Step in a while back too to have these conversations. I can only imagine, you know, there have been times when I think about candidates for office, for instance, where I'm like, oh, they live in this district or they're in the wealthy area town, they must not care about poor people, or whatever. It's just not true, it's not true.

Speaker 2: 26:05

We all have a bunch of. We make assumptions about each other all the time, based on your packaging.

Speaker 1: 26:11

Well, I'm going to charge myself with reaching out to the folks from Befriend, because it's been an organization I've been watching online and I'm really interested to have that conversation. But is there anybody else specifically you think I need to interview and talk to who's making a difference in the community?

Speaker 2: 26:27

I think there's a long list. I always feel that I'm sure you've done this but just someone that is navigating our system. We all say we like community engagement and it might be a little bit harder, but finding someone who is today, this morning, has some kind of challenge and it would be informative for all of us to hear. In spite of all of our best efforts, here's what it feels like when you need to go from plan A to plan B or get through a day in a city that has a lot of things going forward, but there are thousands of people who feel hopeless, and particularly now with the housing challenges that we face. So I think we should also listen to those folks as experts, about their lives and what they see that is working or not working in our community.

Speaker 1: 27:20

I think you're the second guest in two weeks to give that advice and I think I actually have somebody in mind who's been good to be a subject for interviews for me, lives in the Big Six and has been really open and forthcoming with her experience.

Speaker 2: 27:33

I think that's key for all of us, because all of us with degrees and have done this for years. We have lots of meetings and lots of conversations, but we always need to anchor ourselves, and that's what I'm fortunate, that I think I figured out a while ago Anchor yourself in the story of the person who has lived it.

Speaker 2: 27:50

Well, reggie Gordon thanks for coming on. How can folks find you out there in the world? Sure Well, rich Moria Health Foundation. Go to our website and call that number. Our number is on that and I'm around. I'd be happy to have conversations like this or get engaged too. Not just me, but there are other foundations and other non-profits who are doing good work, and I always encourage people to do your research that aligns with what you believe in. Support that organization or group. Don't start your own Work with someone that already exists.

Speaker 1: 28:24

Well, thank you for that advice. I think that's sound. I think we all get that spark sometimes.

Speaker 3: 28:29

We're going to go start something. Who else is out there already?

Speaker 2: 28:32

34 organizations serving non-housing.

Speaker 1: 28:37

Thanks. This was a great conversation. I wish we could talk for longer. We will have you back on in the future when we have some progress to report. I think we are moving fast in the right direction. Sounds great. Thank you, will. This was America's Healthiest City on ESPN, richmond 106.1. Catch us each week here on the channel at 6 am on Thursdays. Catch us next week and subscribe online. Thanks for tuning in.