The New Jersey Department of Health has notified South Orange Village that it intends to award the Village a $119,372 grant that Village officials say will be used toward funding its crisis intervention social worker.
The Local Public Health Infrastructure 2027 grant award is aimed at helping with the state’s local public health workforce and is effective through November of 2027.
“This is very good news,” said South Orange Mayor Sheena Collum. “Always a big thank you to the Health Department and the incredible work that’s coming from our health officer [Candice Davenport] and also the president of our Board of Health [Councilwoman Olivia Lewis-Chang].”
The resolution, which was adopted at the Village Council September 14 meeting, states that the infrastructure grant is awarded to all eligible local health departments to “support workforce, foundational capacity and data modernization.”
The resolution acknowledges “local boards of health are responsible for providing essential services in areas such as emergency response and disaster resiliency, communicable and infectious disease investigation and control, environmental and sanitation inspections and chronic disease prevention and health promotion.”
The full resolution is below:
