Reimagining the Role of Health Departments and Their Partners in Addressing Climate Change: Revising the Building Resilience against Climate Effects (BRACE) Framework.

Public health departments have important roles to play in addressing the local health impacts of climate change, yet are often not well prepared to do so. The Climate and Health Program (CHP) at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) created the Building Resilience Against Climate Effects (BRACE) framework in 2012 as a five-step planning framework to support public health departments and their partners to respond to the health impacts of climate change. CHP has initiated a process to revise the framework to address learnings from a decade of experience with BRACE and advances in the science and practice of addressing climate and health.

Identifying Needs for Advancing the Profession and Workforce in Environmental Health.

An ever-changing landscape for environmental health (EH) requires in-depth assessment and analysis of the current challenges and emerging issues faced by EH professionals. The Understanding the Needs, Challenges, Opportunities, Vision, and Emerging Roles in Environmental Health initiative addressed this need.After receiving responses from more than 1700 practitioners, during an in-person workshop, focus groups identified and described priority problems and supplied context on addressing the significant challenges facing EH professionals with state health agencies and local health departments.

Uncovering Environmental Health: An Initial Assessment of the Profession's Health Department Workforce and Practice.

Environmental health (EH) professionals provide critical services and respond to complex and multifaceted public health threats. The role of these professionals is continually re-emphasized by emergencies requiring rapid and effective responses to address environmental issues and ensure protection of the public's health. Given the prominence of the EH profession within the public health framework, assessing the governmental health department workforce, practice, and current and future challenges is crucial to ensure EH professionals are fully equipped and prepared to protect the nation's health.

INTEGRATING PUBLIC HEALTH IN LAND REUSE AND REDEVELOPMENT: Part 2: Assessing Local Health Agency Capacity to Integrate Environmental Health and Land Reuse Work.

Many local health departments (LHDs) across the country coordinate with their service areas on environmental health or land reuse. The Brownfields & Reuse Opportunity Working Group (BROWN) is a multipartner land reuse stakeholder network that includes member representatives from state and local health agencies, federal agencies, environmental consultants, environmental health professionals, and academia. In 2015, BROWN provided input on five Environmental Health Resources Self Learning Modules (Epidemiology, Risk Assessment, Risk Communications, Land Reuse Sites, and Toxicology) that the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) was developing.