Workforce Solutions Jam

Ashley Kjos, PsyD, L.P. is a Minnesota licensed psychologist (#LP5534) and the Chief Executive Officer of Woodland Centers, a Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic (CCBHC) in west central Minnesota. Dr. Kjos earned her Master’s (2009) and PsyD (2011) in Clinical Psychology at Pacific University in Forest Grove, Oregon. After being a staff psychologist at Woodland Centers from 2011 to 2014 then the Clinical Director from 2014 to 2016, she became its CEO in 2016. As CEO, Dr. Kjos is responsible for the overall coordination of the internal operations of Woodland Centers. The agency has a seven county catchment area and a robust continuum of outpatient, rehabilitative, and residential behavioral healthcare programs serving the entire age range. 

Dr. Kjos is very active in behavioral health services across the state through participation in various associations and serving on non-profit boards. She has served on the board of directors of West Central Industries (WCI), a vocational rehabilitation service provider based out of Willmar, Minnesota from October 2019 to present including being the Vice Chair of this board from 2022 to 2023 and Chair from 2023 to present. She has served as a board member on the Minnesota Association of Resources for Recovery and Chemical Health (MARRCH) from November 2019 to present. Dr. Kjos has been actively involved in the Minnesota Association of Community Mental Health Programs (MACMHP) association since 2014 including advocacy for public policy changes, training, collaboration with providers and associations across the state, and innovation of the mental health and substance use system of care in MN. She has served on the MACMHP board of directors from 2019 to present serving as the Treasurer from 2021-2022 and the board chair from 2022 through 2024. Dr. Kjos is committed to transformation of the healthcare system in the state of Minnesota.  

Dr. Garima Singh, MD is a Chief Medical Officer at Burrell Behavioral Health and its parent company, Brightli. She is triple board certified in American Board of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, General Psychiatry and Addiction Medicine. She also serves as an adjunct faculty in the Department of Psychiatry, University of Missouri and participates as an expert panel for ECHO Child and adolescent psychiatry. Prior to her current position at Burrell Behavioral Health, she was the medical director at the Thompson Center for Autism and Neurodevelopment. Dr. Singh has been actively involved in teaching, multiple committees and research projects related to mental illness and autism. In her current role she also focuses on novel methods of healthcare delivery including telehealth, integrated and collaborative care models especially for rural and underserved areas. She has several publications and has presented in state, national and international level. She specializes in child psychiatry and especially cares of those with special needs, autism, and developmental delays. She is passionate about bullying prevention and expansion of mental health services. 

Dr. Singh grew up in India, earning her medical degree there before completing a fellowship in child psychiatry at Southern Illinois University (SIU) and her general psychiatry residency at the University of Missouri School of Medicine.  

Jim McEvoy is a Principal with Health Management Associates and is accomplished in architecting robust technology solutions for state agencies, health plans and service providers. Jim understands the substantial role data will play in the future of healthcare delivery and works to inform clients around data-driven decisions. He is an experienced project manager and business strategist who has successfully led all phases of diverse Medicaid technology projects. With deep knowledge of CMS reporting, waiver management and pharmacy data, Jim aligns business goals to deliver groundbreaking healthcare IT solutions.

As a vendor for the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, Jim managed projects to develop web-based enrollment tools, federal reporting tools and data warehousing strategies for the department’s 1915(c) waivers, health home projects, autism state plan amendment, and home and community-based services projects. He mitigated risk factors through careful analysis of data and a flexible technical solution set. He anticipated and managed change effectively in rapidly evolving business environments and the transfer of knowledge among different departmental units. Jim defined processes and tools best suited to each project and moved between agile and waterfall approaches depending on project specifics and client goals. He created detailed project road maps, plans, schedules and work breakdown structures.

Jim has been the subject matter expert for Michigan’s pharmacy data warehousing strategy. He oversaw inbound data loads, pharmacy encounter processing, and extracts to health plans and Michigan’s fee-for-service pharmacy benefits manager. With significant experience in systems engineering, Jim led the design, development and rollout of approximately 40 extract, transformation and load (ETL) processes and a dozen web applications for clients with the state of Michigan.

Jim had the privilege of serving as the project manager for the CareConnect360 web application. This tool is responsible for delivering Medicaid claims and encounters information to a diverse user audience, including health plans, community mental health agencies, health home providers and foster care workers. It currently serves seven different business units inside of Michigan’s Department of Health and Human Services.

Jim received his bachelor’s degree from Michigan State University. Jim lives in the Lansing area with his wife and three children. They can often be found camping or at an MSU football game. When not doing those things, Jim is a rehabilitating runner and co-hosts MSU’s least topical sports podcast.

Zach Boyd, PhD is the Director of the Office of Artificial Intelligence Policy at the Utah Department of Commerce. Dr. Boyd is a faculty member at Brigham Young University’s (BYU) mathematics department, where he teaches applied and computational mathematics. Dr. Boyd’s research lab focuses on artificial intelligence, machine learning, and mathematical modeling in social science applications, such as psychology, economics, and social networks. Before working at BYU, Dr. Boyd was a postdoctoral research associate at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, an NDSEG Fellow at UCLA, a research associate at Los Alamos National Laboratory, and a Presidential Scholar at BYU.”

Dr. Carrie Cadwell has been the CEO/President of 4C Health since 2017. She is a licensed psychologist in the state of Indiana. Dr. Cadwell has dedicated her almost 20-year career to rural North Central Indiana communities and, in particular, serving the behavioral health and substance use recovery needs of those with significant socio-economic disadvantage. Her experience spans community mental health, crisis services, youth residential, inpatient psychiatric care,  integrated primary care practice, and outpatient private practice across the lifespan. She is passionate about 4 day work week as a public health intervention and over 90% of 4C Health’s employees work a 32 hour week but are paid for 40 hours.  

Emily Carlstrom, CPRS, is a Certified Peer Recovery Specialist who works with women in recovery to help find ways and resources to live a new way of life. Emily participated in the Recovery Coach Academy through Bold North Recovery and became certified through the Minnesota Certification Board. Emily is in recovery herself and also a graduate of ANEW’s Outpatient program. Emily is also the sober house manager and oversees all six sober homes at ANEW Chemical Health Services. As a former client and resident of the ANEW program, Emily knows firsthand what the women she works with have been through. It has been an amazing journey for her so far and she takes great pride in being able to make a difference in the lives of other women like herself.   

Michaelene Colestock has 22 years of experience in the Substance Use Disorders Treatment field. Currently, Michaelene is the owner, founder, and CEO of ANEW Chemical Health Services a 245G Co-Occurring Treatment Center for adult women. Michaelene has a master’s degree in Counseling Psychology from the University of St. Thomas. Michaelene has a passion for educating others on the topic of addiction. She has taught students at the U of M and Adler Graduation School, facilitated trainings at Metro State University on Co-Occurring Disorders, Family Supportive Housing Center on a variety of topics, MARRCH Conference, Washington DC Conference to Prevent Homelessness, all required 245 G trainings for other treatment centers, and many more informal trainings. Michaelene is most well known for her passion to house women AND their minor children. She has owned and operated sober housing on the East Side of St. Paul since 2010 and her mission is to keep families together while working on recovery. In addition to ANEW Chemical Health Services Michaelene owns and operates Spence Specialties LLC which is 4 sober homes and an 11-unit apartment building located in St. Paul, MN. Spence Specialties has a contract with Ramsey County for Housing Supports and the MN Department of Health Board and Lodge with Special Services. Michaelene has as an affinity for the East Side of St. Paul. She and all of her family members attended primary school at Sacred Heart on 6^th St. and Harding High School. She and all of her siblings, parents, and grandparents were married at Sacred Heart Church. 

Honorary Associate Professor Sean Russell MBE is a researcher focusing on reviewing and delivering interventions for mental wellbeing across the business sector and wider organisations. 

Over the last 7 years, Sean has been the Programme Director that led the development and implementation of the Mental Health Commission Action plan in the West Midlands, England and national Mental Health and Productivity Pilot researching 1150 organisations with over 850,000 employees. He was the founder of Thrive at Work and led the regional response to implementing Thrive into Work.   

He has 35 years of public service experience across Policing, Local Authorities and more recently academia.  Sean is also the COO and European Lead for GLE and works to build leadership and rapid knowledge exchange across addiction, disability, and mental health. 

Letecia Timmel, LCSW has been employed with 4C Health for the past 9.5 years in various capacities. Most recently, Letecia has been serving as the Senior Clinician that oversees clinical supervision of master’s level therapists and practicum students. Letecia is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in the state of Indiana and has been working in Community Mental Health for almost 20 years with an additional 4 years working in an inpatient setting. Letecia has experience in the delivery and supervision of wraparound services to at-risk youth, system of care development in the community, quality management, individual and group therapy and clinical supervision. Letecia is passionate about trauma and secondary traumatic stress as it pertains to staff and often provides support to staff and community members following crises. 

Lori Fertall is the Director of Value-Based Programs at Community Care Behavioral Health, a non-profit behavioral health managed care organization that is part of the Insurance Services Division of UPMC headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In this position, she is responsible for the creation, implementation, evaluation, and reporting of value-based purchasing arrangements with behavioral health providers. Previously as Community Care’s Director of Quality Management, she implemented quality management programs and performance improvement projects across the company and its provider networks. She regularly presents to a variety of local and national audiences at conferences on topics such as value-based purchasing, quality improvement, and payer/provider relationships. Prior to joining Community Care, Lori worked at various health and human service agencies in clinical and program development roles. She earned a master’s degree in Business Administration from Point Park University, a bachelor’s degree in Social Work and Women’s Studies from West Virginia University, and a Lean Six-Sigma Green Belt from UPMC.  

John O’Brien has more than 30 years of experience in behavioral health systems design, financing, and implementation. He has worked with Medicaid, mental health, and substance abuse authorities in numerous states to develop federal Medicaid waivers, Medicaid state plan amendments, and federal grant applications. A former Senior Consultant at TAC, Mr. O’Brien directed the organization’s work on substance use disorders (SUDs) with an emphasis on helping states increase access to services, integrate SUD treatment and primary care, and reduce unnecessary costs by using Medicaid and other sources to support effective systems. He was the subject matter expert for several states in their efforts to implement systems of care for children and families with serious mental health conditions and on community integration strategies for adults with serious mental illness.

Mr. O’Brien has worked for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in leadership roles with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). At CMS, he led the Innovation Accelerator Program for Substance Use Disorder and Primary and Mental Health Integration and coordinated the agency’s efforts on developing guidance regarding parity for Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program. Mr. O’Brien played a significant role in the implementation of Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act and in developing the Home and Community Based Services regulations. At SAMHSA, he was Senior Advisor to the Administrator on Health Care Reform. 

Jin Lee (Jinny) Palen is the Executive Director of the Minnesota Association of Community Mental Health Programs (MACMHP) and Convergence Integrated Care, a clinically integrated network of community mental health centers across Minnesota. Her background includes public health research and analysis, community engagement, legislative advocacy, government relations, public policy, and community leadership. Prior to her role with MACMHP, Jinny was Minnesota Association of Community Health Centers (MNACHC) Public Policy Staff. Jinny stays active in her local neighborhood community clinic and AAPI community. Jinny worked for the Minnesota Department of Health in the Health Economics Program, Tobacco Prevention and Control, and the Legislative Affairs Office. Jinny was a Legislative Policy Fellow of the Partners for the Americas Policy Exchange Fellowship in 2014. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Biology from the College of Saint Benedict, St. Joseph MN, and a Master of Public Health degree from the University of Minnesota.  

Samantha Repka is a Research Associate at the Duke-Margolis Institute for Health Policy where she focuses on issues related to care delivery and payment reform, behavioral health including substance use disorder, and other public health issues.  Previously, Samantha worked at the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, where she served as a Director of Public Policy. Prior to her time in NYC, she was a Senior Manager at AcademyHealth and a Teach for America Corps Member. She holds a Master of Science in Public Health and a Bachelor of Science in Public Health from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Melissa Blackwell, MSW has over 20 years of experience in the behavioral health field; and initially starting her career as a case manager for adults with Serious Mental Illnesses. Melissa served in various roles with Department of Juvenile Services, Psychotherapeutic Services, Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, and Department of Health & Human Services. Ms. Blackwell dedicated 10 years of Federal service as a Treatment Specialist who ensured each client received a thorough assessment and treatment referral for their behavioral health needs. Melissa is currently a Project Officer for Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration; overseeing the Minority Fellowship Program and Historically Black Colleges and Universities grants. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology from Morgan State University and Master of Social Work at University of Maryland, Baltimore. Melissa enjoys reading, hiking, and creating memories with family and friends during her spare time.

Ebony Chambers is the Director of Equity-Grounded Leadership for The College for Behavioral Health Leadership. In this role, she oversees the delivery, facilitation, content, and progress of the Equity-Grounded Leadership (EGL) Fellow Program.  Ebony has over 18 years of experience working with issues of social justice, equity, education, mental health and diversity.

Terence Fitzgerald, PhD, EdM, MSW, who specializes in trauma-informed, resilience-oriented, equity-focused systems (TIROES), was previously a clinical associate professor of social work at the University of Southern California’s Suzanne Peck-Dworak School of Social Work. Dr. Fitzgerald grew up in Champaign, Ill. He earned a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts, master’s degrees in school social work and educational leadership and a doctorate in education policy studies from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. As both a social worker and a race and gender scholar, for 12 years, Dr. Fitzgerald worked through K-12th grade levels as a school social worker, and then later as a special education equity coordinator in racially and economically diverse settings in Central Illinois. He has worked with social justice grassroots organizations that focus on marginalized children and families, aligned for the purpose of meeting state and federal requirements, and helped organizations and corporations work toward meeting the needs of culturally and socially just organizations and environments. Professionally, he has utilized his program and curriculum evaluation talents to enable public schools in Illinois to make financial, efficient, ethical, racially just policy, program and curriculum changes. His expertise as a racial scholar is spotlighted in numerous international and national media outlets, peer-reviewed journals, and collaborative and independently published books, including “The Reality of Diversity, Gender and Skin Color: From Living Room to Classroom,” “White Prescriptions? The Dangerous Social Potential for Ritalin and other Psychotropic Drugs to Harm Black Males” and “Black Males and Racism: Improving the Schooling and Life Chances of African Americans.”

Brandon Jones is the CEO at Triad, a leading provider of education, community, and career resources for behavioral and mental health students, professionals, and organizations. Before joining Triad in 2019, Brandon spent nearly two decades at Kaplan Test Prep: he started his career as an SAT instructor, and then advanced through a series of roles leading various field and home office functions, with the last several spent as the President of the largest business unit at Kaplan. Brandon is passionate about the transformative power of education; and as an advocate of grit and growth mindset, he believes that just about anyone can do just about anything. Brandon has an A.B. in English and American Literature and Language from Harvard University, and lives in New York City with his wife and daughter. 

Peter Delia is a Federal Policy Manager for the National Council for Mental Wellbeing. Peter manages a number of federal policy portfolios for the National Council, including issues related to workforce, telehealth, equity, 988/crisis, and social determinants of health. Prior to coming to the National Council, Peter worked as a senior attorney for the Florida Senate, where he drafted and analyzed legislation related to behavioral health, Medicaid, child welfare, and elder care issues. Peter has also worked as a senior attorney for the Florida Department of Health, where he practiced administrative litigation and prosecuted disciplinary matters concerning physicians, optometrists, chiropractors, psychologists, and dentists. Peter is a South Florida native and currently lives in Tallahassee, FL with his wife, Eliza.

Beth Kuhn, MILR has over 30 years of experience creating and implementing innovative workforce, human service and health programs, leading collaborations among business, government, and nonprofit partners.  

Beth currently serves as Workforce Consultant with the Kentucky Department of Behavioral Health, Developmental and Intellectual Disabilities, and as Principal at Stonegate Strategies, a consultancy focused on futuristic workforce development strategies across sectors and organizations.  Beth’s focus is on the workforce of the future – including a special interest and expertise in the behavioral health workforce – and the human and digital transformation of organizations, people practices, and public services needed to support the next generation of customers. 

Beth previously served as Chief Engagement Officer at the Kentucky Cabinet of Health and Family Services, leading workforce policy and operational efforts to better serve customers and offer them multiple pathways to employment and stability.  She served in both Democratic and Republican administrations as Commissioner of the Kentucky Department of Workforce Investment and as Director of Workforce Development for the Vermont Department of Labor, collaborating across systems to provide employment, vocational rehabilitation, veterans, unemployment insurance, and other workforce services.   

Beth has a BA in Public Policy from the James Madison College of Michigan State University, and a MILR in Industrial and Labor Relations from Cornell University. She lives in Louisville, Kentucky and in Vergennes, Vermont. 

Dr. Gina Lasky, PhD, MAPL, is a Managing Director for Behavioral Health at Health Management Associates (HMA). Dr. Lasky is a national expert in behavioral health strategy, policy, clinical design and operations and partnership development. Her career combines experience as a licensed psychologist with decades of experience in the public sector with a depth of system and policy design as well as expertise in cross- sector leadership. Working with states, counties, managed care plans and large providers across the country, her work focuses on behavioral health system design, payment and quality, program innovation and operations including workforce. She is passionate about effective implementation of behavioral health integration and supporting providers on quality improvement such as enhancing measurement- based care; bringing behavioral health services into the community; partnership development; and leveraging human centered design in behavioral health. Dr. Lasky earned her master’s and doctorate in counseling psychology from the University of Denver and a master’s degree in public leadership with a specialization in multi-sector management from George Washington University.

Dr. Katie Marks serves as the Commissioner for the Kentucky Department for Behavioral Health, Developmental and Intellectual Disabilities. As a behavioral scientist, Dr. Marks supports the departmental mission of promoting health and well-being by facilitating recovery for people whose lives have been affected by mental illness and substance use; supporting people with intellectual or other developmental disabilities; and building resilience for all. Dr. Marks previously served as the project director for the Kentucky Opioid Response Effort (KORE); bringing expertise focused on state, community, and organizational-level strategies as well as policies that support recovery from the overdose epidemic. Dr. Marks received a doctorate in Experimental Psychology from the University of Kentucky and a graduate certificate in Clinical and Translational Science. 

Dr. Vestena Robbins is the Senior Executive Advisor for Innovation and Implementation Support in the Kentucky Department for Behavioral Health, Developmental and Intellectual Disabilities within the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services. In this role, Dr. Robbins leads behavioral health innovation, implementation, and system transformation efforts. She has over 30 years experience in the behavioral health services field as a behavioral health services researcher, program evaluator, and program administrator and has direct care experience in early care and education and as an elementary school counselor.  

Currently, Dr. Robbins serves as the Principal Investigator of Kentucky’s System of Care Implementation and Expansion grant for child welfare and juvenile justice-involved families; Co-Coordinator for two 988 Workforce Transformation Transfer Initiatives; and leads the Behavioral Health, Developmental and Intellectual Disabilities Workforce Innovation and Development Collaborative. She serves as the department’s designee for the Kentucky Center for School Safety Board of Directors; Kentucky’s CCBHC Demonstration Project; Kentucky State Interagency Council for Services to Children and Transition-Age Youth; Kentucky Healthcare Workforce Collaborative Advisory Group; Kentucky Healthcare Workforce Investment Fund Steering Committee; Kentucky Coalition for Healthy Students; Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) Subcommittee of the Kentucky Board of Education; Cabinet for Health and Family Services’ State University Partnership Advisory Board; Kentucky Juvenile Justice Oversight Council; and the Juvenile Justice Workgroup of the Kentucky Judicial Commission on Mental Health. Dr. Robbins staffs the Social and Emotional Health and Wellbeing and Service Array Standing Committees of the State Interagency Council for Services to Children and Transition-Age Youth. She is a long-standing board member of the Kentucky Council for Children with Behavior Disorders; Red Bird Mission, Inc.; Camp Beacon; and a founding board member of GLSEN Bluegrass. Dr. Robbins is Co-Chair of the Cabinet for Health and Family Services Institutional Review Board. 

Dr. Robbins received a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology from Berea College, a Master’s Degree in Community and School Counseling from the University of South Florida, and a doctorate in Child and Family Research and Policy from the University of South Florida. She completed a Graduate Certificate in Children’s Mental Health through the University of South Florida in 2008. 

Holly Salazar, MPH, is Chief Executive Officer of The College for Behavioral Health Leadership (CBHL), a leadership organization supporting current and emerging cross-sector leaders with learned and lived experience to collectively advance behavioral health in North America. Holly has worked for more than 15 years in public and community health roles in community-based, non-profit, health care, and local government organizations. An experienced systems leader, Holly engages with cross-sector leaders to form strong partnerships and create transformative change. Holly believes in the power of true collaboration and leveraging collective talents to solve problems.

Ross Lohr, Managing Director, Accelerate the Future

Ross Lohr (he/him) is the managing director of Accelerate The Future, a private family foundation based in Massachusetts. Originally from Newton, Massachusetts, Lohr received his bachelor’s degrees in economics and psychology from Boston University and an MBA in non-profit management from the Heller School of Social Policy at Brandeis University. While at Boston University, Lohr founded a non-profit organization providing educational opportunities to children in rural Tanzania, and later founded a social enterprise creating fair wage jobs at a worker owned factory in North Carolina around textile recycling.  

Alexis Murray, MSW, Director, Program Operations, Loan Operations, Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers

Alexis Murray is the Director of Program Operations, Workforce Initiatives at the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers (Mass League). She directs many programs that are in support of a broad range of the Massachusetts workforce, including the Mass League’s community health centers as well as other community-based organizations. Over the course of the past fifteen years, Alexis has become an expert and advocate for the Massachusetts workforce needs. In 2017 and again in 2022, Alexis was selected to be on Mass League’s procurement response teams that ultimately brought in the two largest contracts ever to be awarded to the Mass League. 

Brie Reimann, Vice President, Practice Improvement and Consulting, National Council for Mental Wellbeing

Brie Reimann (she/her) is the Vice President of Practice Improvement and Consulting at the National Council for Mental Wellbeing, a membership organization that drives policy and social change on behalf of 3,400 mental health and substance use treatment organizations and the more than 10 million children, adults and families they serve. In her role she provides department leadership over 40+ practice improvement initiatives that aim to improve access to and quality of care for individuals living with mental illness and substance use concerns. She is a passionate change leader who believes that all individuals and families should have equitable access to quality health care services. Prior to joining the National Council Reimann led statewide integrated care initiatives in Colorado focusing on primary care, mental health, substance use and HIV care settings working toward advancing comprehensive care  to provide essential primary, treatment and recovery services for all individuals and families.

Maia Banks, Supervisory Public Health Advisory, CMHS, SAMHSA

Maia Banks is a Supervisory Public Health Advisor within the Center for Mental Health Services (CMHS), Office of the Director (OD). She supports special projects and serves as a co-staff lead for the Cross-SAMHSA Workforce Workgroup. Prior to working in the OD, Maia served as the Branch Chief for the Community Support Programs Branch and supported special projects within the Division of Community Behavioral Health.