Assistant Commissioner, Health Promotion of Justice- Impacted Populations

Established in 1805, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (the NYC Health Department) is the oldest and largest health department in the country. Our mission is to protect and improve the health of all New Yorkers, in service of a vision of a city in which all New Yorkers can realize their full health potential, regardless of who they are, how old they are, where they are from, or where they live.

As a world-renowned public health agency with a history of building transformative public health programming and infrastructure, innovating in science and scholarship to advance public health knowledge, and responding to urgent public health crises from New York City’s yellow fever outbreak in 1822, to the COVID-19 pandemic we are a hub for public health innovation, expertise, and programs, and services. We serve as the population health strategist, and policy, and planning authority for the City of New York, while also having a vast impact on national and international public policy, including programs and services focused on food and nutrition, anti-tobacco support, chronic disease prevention, HIV/AIDS treatment, family and child health, environmental health, mental health, and racial and social justice work, among others.

Our Agency’s five strategic priorities, building off a recently-completed strategic planning process emerging from the COVID-19 emergency, are:
1) To re-envision how the Health Department prepares for and responds to health emergencies, with a focus on building a “response-ready” organization, with faster decision-making, transparent public communications, and stronger surveillance and bridges to healthcare systems 2) Address and prevent chronic and diet-related disease, including addressing rising rates of childhood obesity and the impact of diabetes, and transforming our food systems to improve nutrition and enhance access to healthy foods
3) Address the second pandemic of mental illness including: reducing overdose deaths, strengthening our youth mental health systems, and supporting people with serious mental illness
4) Reduce black maternal mortality and make New York a model city for women’s health
5) Mobilize against and combat the health impacts of climate change

Our 7,000-plus team members bring extraordinary diversity to the work of public health. True to our value of equity as a foundational element of all of our work, and a critical foundation to achieving population health impact in New York City, the NYC Health Department has been a leader in recognizing and dismantling racism’s impacts on the health of New Yorkers and beyond. In 2021, the NYC Board of Health declared racism as a public health crisis. With commitment to advance anti-racist public health practices that dismantle systems that perpetuate inequitable power, opportunity and access, the NYC Health Department continues to work in and with communities and community organizations to increase their access to health services and decrease avoidable health outcomes.

BUREAU AND JOB DESCRIPTION:

The NYC department of Health and Mental Hygiene seeks an Assistant Commissioner to lead the Division of Mental Hygiene’s Bureau of Health Promotion of Justice- Impacted Population. The Assistant Commissioner will be responsible for strategic oversight of a progressive Public Health/Public Safety agenda, including system transformation, programmatic initiatives, best practices, policy, and advocacy around regulatory and legislative matters.

The Bureau of Health Promotion for Justice-Impacted Populations (HPJIP) aims to reduce the negative social and health consequences of justice system involvement through innovative policy and practice change. By centering community, addressing racial inequities, honoring lived experience, and elevating trauma-and-resilience-informed-approaches, we promote evidence-based best practices to address the needs of those disproportionately impacted by the criminal legal system.


- Direct oversight of the Bureau’s units: Crisis, Prevention and Intervention Unit (CPIU), Health and Justice EpiCenter, and Transitions to Community (T2C), Policy, Operations and the Bureau Administrative team.

- Provide overall strategic direction, programmatic oversight, staff leadership and drive research and evaluation for the Bureau.

- Includes over 140 staff, procurements, research and data agreements, and over $24 million dollars in FY24 contracts and fiscal agreements.

- Principal advisor to the Executive Deputy Commissioner, and at times the Commissioner of Health, on all Bureau matters and content expert on community safety, criminal justice and health.

- Member of Division of Mental Hygiene senior leadership team

- Partner and collaborate with other Mental Hygiene divisional bureaus and offices as well as other divisions within the Department

- Represent the Bureau/Division/Department to mayoral offices, government and non-government partners, including maintaining strong working relationships with constituent groups, providers, and the communities of NYC

- Represent Bureau policy priorities including: advocating for policy shifts around access to care and services pre- and post-incarceration, building legislative agendas, and a host of other key issues impacting NYC s justice-involved population with health issues

- Represent the Bureau, Mental Hygiene and the Department in various forms of public facing events including, public hearings, presentations, town hall meetings, community board meetings, etc.

- Drive racial equity/social justice in all the Bureau’s work.

1. Graduation from an approved medical school, a license to practice medicine in the State of New York, completion of an approved internship, and completion of an approved residency in psychiatry; and (3) years of progressively responsible administrative or executive experience in Psychiatry, in community mental health organization or in a psychiatric institution employing the integrated services of psychiatrists, psychologists and social workers; or

2. A doctorate degree from an accredited college or university with specialization in psychology, sociology, anthropology, public health, social work, education, or related field; and five (5) of full-time experience in an administrative or executive capacity in responsible charge of a social, psychiatric or health agency, or a major division thereof; or

3. A satisfactory equivalent.

The City of New York is an inclusive equal opportunity employer committed to recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce and providing a work environment that is free from discrimination and harassment based upon any legally protected status or protected characteristic, including but not limited to an individual's sex, race, color, ethnicity, national origin, age, religion, disability, sexual orientation, veteran status, gender identity, or pregnancy.