The Scoop with Tanya Flanagan

Unknown Speaker 0:00
This is a Kun V studios original program. The content of this program does not reflect the views or opinions of 91.5 jazz and more the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, or the Board of Regents of the Nevada System of Higher Education.

Unknown Speaker 0:19
Good morning, and thank you for joining me for the scoop with Tanya Flanagan, I'm so happy you decided to wake up and start your day with me here on the scoop, where we talk about life, joy, funny moments, trending topics and so much more. We promise to keep you in the know and find out what you know. So let's get started.

Unknown Speaker 0:42
You Good morning Las Vegas, and welcome to another Sunday morning, another Sunday morning here with me on the scoop on 91.5 we are in the middle of August. Summer is one of my favorite seasons from time to time. As you know, on the show, I like to do what I call a man or a woman on the street segment, which is an opportunity to introduce you to a person that you might not know, but maybe should know, or at least a person who super interesting and does a great work in our community, and it's very much a benefit to humanity and humankind. So this morning, I am excited and delighted to welcome to the show, my friend, my peer, woman of strength and great integrity and just who does tremendous work. Elisa Howard, to the show. Good morning. Alisa,

Unknown Speaker 1:36
good morning. Tanya, thank you for having me.

Unknown Speaker 1:39
Thank you for getting up. I know it's early, and I hope you have a cozy cup of coffee, tea, or whatever your favorite thing is going on,

Unknown Speaker 1:46
but he is my thing, and I do have a cup right here.

Unknown Speaker 1:49
Well, you are ready, I am ready, so we're going to jump into it, but I your walk, your journey in life, is fascinating to me, because you deal with something that affects our lives every day, our health, and you concentrate your energy in the space of public health and doing things that are educational to those around you. And I love the energy that you bring and the excitement that you bring to raising awareness to why health is so important so you are when I, you know, started kind of looking into you deeper than the surface of me, just knowing you as a person, liking you as a person, and enjoying, you know, some of the time that we've been able to spend together in social settings, entrepreneur, writer, author. And then I want to talk about the scripture that you you put up to describe yourself. But you know, you're an entrepreneur. So you started a company, you run minority health consultants, and you're a young woman, you know you're you're still over, you know under the hump. You haven't reached the midpoint. We're gonna give you that, yeah, you haven't reached the midpoint. You have a whole bunch of miles left. How did you end up in this space of public health and what when we say public health, what do you want people to think about when

Unknown Speaker 3:05
I say public health, I want people to think about the health of their communities, the health of the world, the health of their their neighbors down the street. That's exactly what the word Public means. Is that anything that affects us publicly, such as the pandemic that just happened. One person could have had it, but it affected the whole world. That is public health, also environmental health, and all these things that are happening in our climate right now, that's public health. So I want people, when they hear public health, not to just think of covid in the pandemic. I know it was a horrible thing, but think of all the things that affect us, also environmentally but also transportation has to do with public health and going to parks, and whether we have enough parks in the right areas of town in our air is everybody getting equal access to the things that make us healthy. That's what I want people to think about when I when I say public health, I don't want to go into the definition of it, because it throws people off. So I just want them to think of those key things. No,

Unknown Speaker 4:05
I think making a difference providing a definition that makes it a relatable topic, a relatable idea, is the best way to define something, because you you give person the opportunity to personalize what they're hearing and recognize where they fit in the ecosystem of this thought process. And so I appreciate that you did, you know, defining the way you deal with the examples. Because when we're when you're going through life and you're busy, you don't always think about, you know, everybody doesn't have the benefit, I guess I should say, of living close to a park or living in a community that has, I mean, I know how when I'm just driving around town and I drive into, say, the Summerlin area, or, you know, a very a master plan to community, community. Let's put it that way. And there's something about being in that kind of space, regardless of what part of town I might be in, because I'm always all over the place. There is a. Different sense of calm, I think, that you get when you drive into the the space, the aura of the master plan community, the tree lined streets, the perfectly manicured lawn, the you know, the landscaping, the esthetics, it just creates a different soothing and calm. But can you imagine, if you are in a community that may be more, you know, lower income or different dynamics, more urban, just more urban, you're not surrounded by that. So, you know, there's not a sense of feeling of escape and soothing and peace, but and people are affected differently by that hustle and bustle, that pressure of getting through everyday responsibilities. So I think that's part of what you're you know, you're bringing to the to the forefront is the reality that our surroundings affect our health, and we don't think about it. You know, tears down your stress levels, or blood blood, hypertension presents itself, diabetes, obesity, habits, mental health, all these things play into it. How do you find yourself into the in this Were you always in this space? No, I

Unknown Speaker 6:13
wasn't always in this space. I've been in the space now for the last 12 years, but I accidentally ended up in this space. So I call myself the accidental public health advocate, because I didn't know that I would end up going into this field and loving it and loving the space of helping people and advocating on the behalf of people. There's so many different branches of public health that you can work in. You can work in research, you can work in environmental health, you can work in health promotion surveillance. You can be behind the scenes, working behind the computer, sending data to the CDC. You can work in outreach. And I found myself advocating and Policy and Outreach and Education and making things normalized for everyday people as my passion. So that's why I call myself the accidental public health advocate, because I actually come from a background of law. I was a paralegal for three years. Actually thought I wanted to be an attorney. Probably still do, but I didn't. I did not find myself in that field, loving it the way that I found myself clicking with public health once I entered it also come from a space of banking, so banking basically paid for all of my degrees, and I knew I didn't want to stay in that space. It really was just a means to an end. So I come from all these different backgrounds, and that's what I like to tell people. I accidentally fell into this field, but I love it, and I love helping people, and I love people knowing how to be well and how to change the trajectory of their lives just by living better, eating better, um, you know, living in a different neighborhood, if they can. You know, financial well, being, all of that is part of our what we call social determinants of health, and that's the part that I love about it.

Unknown Speaker 7:52
I like that because it's an opportunity to continuously dialog with people and raise their awareness. Everything that you said made me think about the scripture that you noted is one near and dear to your heart, and it's Jeremiah, 2911, For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future. It's it really resonated and spoke to me that that was your scripture of choice. Like everyone, usually, well, not everyone, but when people have a favorite scripture, you know there's a reason behind why. And even hearing you speaking, I want you to touch more on your why, but even hearing you talk about path that led you into the work you're doing, it's not knowing what you want, but a place of trust and faith moving forward and the Scripture sort of speaks to exactly how you say the pattern of your life was, you know, put together

Unknown Speaker 8:49
absolutely. I always tell people like, the accident public health advocate is just like, you know, a quick little slogan that you that we do these days. But really, I didn't, nothing is of accident. Everything is planned by God and a person. I'm a person of faith, and as long as I was, you know, just doing what I knew that God wanted me to do, which is always helping people. When I think back to all of my jobs, when I look at the the core of what they were, it was all helping people, banking, you know, being there for people, helping them get their checking and they're saying the count together and teaching them about overdraft protection. I've always been that teacher, and so when I really sat down and thought about just where I am in life, I was like, This is not an accident. I planned everything to for my good, and everything that I that I have been has been added to who I am. Now I needed to have customer service skills to get into this field. So that's what baking taught me. I needed to understand law and policy and know how to research law, and that's what being a paralegal taught me. And now I wind up in a field where I can use all that he's given me and all that he's allowed me to see in this field so that I can be a better servant for him. So Jeremiah 2911 is my absolute favorite of. Scripture, because I know that he knows that I know that he basically did this for me because I wouldn't have chosen public health. I had no idea what public health even was.

Unknown Speaker 10:12
Yeah, I think after we talk about it this morning, people will look at it differently, because when you You're right, you hear, you know, terms tossed around, and you're like public health, and it's like this abstract thing that's just, there's public there's health, and what is that exactly? Or how does that, you know, really affect me? And what are the things that I should think about relative to this space of public health? And you think about people around you being healthy, you're sick, what you think is that you don't want to be sick with whatever it is the person standing next to you has but there's a responsibility that we have to live life a certain way and be mindful of our actions to keep Earth and where we live as healthy as possible, and also now, for now and for future generations. I mean, it's as simple as we really need to think about. Is the future generation? You know? It's simply, you know, it's climate change, it's planting trees, it's water conservation, it's just, you know, it's loitering, it's litter, it's pollution. All of these things tie back to, you know, your public health, but what your role is, and that and how it's important. And I just think that you put it into a space of mindfulness that can make a person really think about it in a personal and intentional way. And

Unknown Speaker 11:27
that's how I want people to think about it. I want people to think that they're not just, you know, one drop, you know, of this sum of people that's on Earth, but they really do matter, and that everything that they do, including, like you said, littering and messing up the environment, and anything else that we would, that we do, has a lasting effect, and that's affecting the public, which is public health. And I just want people to think of that in in that type of way, just because the definition alone can really throw people off. And like you said, it could be too big and too cumbersome for people to think about. So they think, Oh, I'm just so small. This has nothing to do with me, but it really does.

Unknown Speaker 12:03
So what do you do like in a given day, week, month, in this space? Are you teaching classes, presenting? How do you what type of work does one do as an advocate for public health? Do you train people

Unknown Speaker 12:20
I do. So I do all of that. Actually, I get on podcasts at radio shows like

Unknown Speaker 12:27
public health teachable moments. Okay, yes,

Unknown Speaker 12:30
I also ran a radio show. I ran two different radio shows that there were all public health awareness and education, so I would have these topics and these conversations on those shows I teach, it just depends on the week. Literally, my week changes from week to week. Last week, I was in a community health worker training class where I taught people from Dignity Health that had just recently been hired as community health workers. I was teaching them the community health worker training and how to basically be me, how to be me and go out on the ground and teach their communities how to be healthy. And then, so the week before that, I, you know, I was in a conference. I was in Tampa, Florida, and I was at a aging disability conference, learning how to help people, as they age and disabled people, how to get them back into education and health awareness and things of that nature. So every week in my world as a as a consultant and entrepreneur, changes, which is why I love it, and that's why I started my business, because I get bored easily. And if I just have one job every single day for more than three years, I'm over it. And so I needed to mix it up. I needed it to be kind of creative, where I can be a creative person still in this space of such corporate, you know, corporate Americanness. And so for me, it's about creating my world every single week. What do I want to do this week? And really, it's based off of my contracts and the people that hire me and pay me, obviously, but then I always try to make sure that I'm tapping back into the things that I love, which is community.

Unknown Speaker 14:03
So when you do this, it's obviously a melting pot of people that you're helping, because this is applicable to anyone and everyone. But are there certain segments, I mean, I know you're a black woman, so are there certain segments of the community that are a passionate focus for you? Yes,

Unknown Speaker 14:17
that's the reason why my company name is minority health consultants. I focus on minority communities. I focus on black, indigenous, people of color, the terminology we now use as bipoc communities. I focus on marginalized communities, vulnerable communities. So it's not always people of color that are in vulnerable communities. Sometimes it's just people down the street from you, but because they just had a fire at their house, those are considered a vulnerable community at that very moment, and the smoke is affecting public health. So it's all of those people. It's the people who can't really help themselves, and it's up to us to be able to help them. Well, I noticed

Unknown Speaker 14:53
that when I was kind of looking at some of the things that you do, you make sure people, you share a lot of information, and it. Is a vast array of information, from walking to get healthy classes and challenges that might last six weeks, places where people can get the community health worker training. You talk about networking, even networking and the mindfulness of the intentionality, as you called it, using your time wisely, how you're extending yourself. I think here's here's a abstract thought. Oftentimes, as busy people, we're over extending ourselves, right? And it's not until you get wiser that you start to realize, oh, maybe I need to be more intentional with how I use my time or where I give it. Should one? Should one see that as a public health concern because of the exponential breakdown of the time you gave, you could be resting, you could be sleeping, you could be doing something that adds more value to your life, thus your health. Like, is that too abstract? Absolutely. Look at it. No.

Unknown Speaker 16:01
So over the years, I've had to pivot my company several times because, like you said, I was all over the place. Now, all of the things that I do are wrapped in about four things. It's teaching, it's policy, so it's health, education, which encompasses teaching, obviously it's policy. That's just one thing by itself. Then there's the advocacy piece that kind of goes with the policy, because I'm advocating just on social media, or I'm advocating in testimonials for legislation, but it's kind of mixed in with the policy. And then I'm consulting, and consulting is just simply getting on with companies that hire me to help them build their programs. And so I focus on those areas, and I like to put things in buckets. Because of that exact reason, I pivoted twice in my business since I started in 2018 because of that, I was burnt out. I was trying to do everything for everybody, and was not taking care of myself. And burnout happens, when that happened, when that, when that occurs during the pandemic. It was a time where I was all I need. I felt the need to save people's lives, and so I was getting called by policy people, get on this call, get on this legislation call. We need to find money and how to get it into the black communities, into the Hispanic communities, into the Native American communities. So I was, I was doing that. I was doing legislation, but I also was had a contract with the health district where it was like, we also need you to go out, mask up and teach, you know, out in the community, and we need you to help people get their vaccines and help direct them. And so I was doing that. I hired a lot of community health workers during that time. So my business expanded, and it was great to have taught so many people over the years, probably over 500 students I've taught, but to be able to reach back out to them and say, hey, now is the time. It's time to put those skill sets to use. So when I think of like the pandemic, I think of burnout, because it was one of those times where I felt like I needed to be in all those spaces. Now, of course, four years later, I'm wiser. I'm older also, and I don't want to run around that like that. So I've learned how to take care of my mental health, which is a part of public health as well, because if I'm if I'm mentally not right, and I'm going out into public, it does affect the public. And I've learned to do that through rest, and that's through books, and that's through sitting and talking to people like you, and you know, you all telling me, like, girl, you need to stop doing all of this. You're going to burn yourself out. You know, just my big sisters in the community having those conversations and somebody telling me it's okay not to hustle hard. It's okay to, you know, you know who you are now, just be in that space and just learning all of that have been part of my mental health and how I've been able to sustain being an entrepreneur.

Unknown Speaker 18:46
I think the lesson of authenticity that you're talking about right now is invaluable. It's priceless. You cannot put a price tag on the moment in life when you come into your own, I guess, for lack of a better way to describe it, and you really, really have the lesson of authenticity, and it resonates with you to be I, because I know what you talked about over the years. Served on a number of boards, yes, yes, yes to so many things. And then it might have been, I think covid, covid had an exponential impact on a lot of people. You know, sadly, we lost people. People lost family. Or in that period, if you lost someone, and it wasn't to actually covid, but you lost them, there was such a the barriers and the obstacles to getting to them. So it was a crazy time, because I think I saw more people pass away, and that particular year, year and a half, two year period than I had ever seen before my life, where I actually knew the knew the person, and had a relationship, you knew the person. Yes, it was, it was. It was really just crazy how I really knew the people. People that we were losing. But the

Unknown Speaker 20:02
other thing about it, we never really recovered from that mentally. We never really because no one ever talked about it. No one ever got on the news, obviously, and talked about how much we lost during that time. So when I even think about it today, I think about has, have people taken care of themselves since then? Have people gone and talked to, you know someone, or have they just stepped back and really looked at their lives and really like taken in how much we lost I

Unknown Speaker 20:28
get, where you're going? I don't know. I wish I had a question. I think for me, it definitely slowed me down not being able to go to all the I mean, we're back at it, right? Deep, heavy, running, busy. And you know, 88 days, 85 days, that's a whole nother story. But 82 whatever we're on at this point, 80 but at any way, we're at a whole different point of crucial conjunction, if you will, in this country. But we're back at this busy pace being places. People can get back in each other's faces. They can go to each other's homes. You can meet up in the restaurants. You can do concerts, you can do clubs, you can do whatever. And so people are back at their pace, their optimum pace. But I think that that period made me re evaluate how and when, just like you said, and have a focus, and I'm probably and every so often, I think you have to stop, and you have to push the reset button periodically, because it will get away from you, and you'll find yourself it will, yep, it'll get away from you, and you'll find yourself saying yes to all these different things. And before you look up, you're doing the same thing you were doing before, and you wonder why you're tired. And nothing feels like it's really a finished product for lack of a better right? And that's

Unknown Speaker 21:40
why you have to be Yeah, and that's why you have to be mindful. So I keep the pandemic in the back of my mind. It's easier for me, obviously, because I'm I'm still in public health, and I still think about on an everyday basis, and we're still fighting diseases on an everyday basis. So for me, I just think of 2020, and I'm like, Oh, I don't want to feel that burnout again. So when I am starting to feel like I'm spread too thin, I'm all over the place, I immediately shut it down. So I've incorporated some things into my life to help me to be more mindful about that. So the month of December, I'm off the entire month July and December of my business, I just take off. I don't care what contract I have. I let them know before I even sign the contract. Oh, by the way, this was going to go into my

Unknown Speaker 22:22
here's what, I don't work. I just don't you can't get me in July, being a summer baby who was born on July 20, I can 100% CO sign your July vacay and December. Well, hey, it's the holiday season. What else is there to do? But thought that came to my mind a moment ago when you were talking because it was a question to you, since we've been since we went through covid in the pandemic, do you feel we're in this cyclical, cyclical space of pandemic, pandemics, but global being more mindful of global infections, For example, monkey pox or inboxes in the news. It's being built as overseas, but we both know from covid, these things can get to our homeland, and it's necessary to be mindful of it. But do you think we're in it and we're coming into the last five minutes of the show? So I want to make sure I get your social handles out, but before I do you think we're in this cycle where it's just going to keep a revolving door of major health concerns to be worried about?

Unknown Speaker 23:27
Absolutely, absolutely, and the sad thing is that we we haven't learned, and that's the reason why I say absolutely, because humans have not learned their lesson from this pandemic that we just went through. I'm constantly not arguing, but kind of going back and forth with people on social media when they say crazy things, like, I don't ever want to hear covid again. I don't want to talk about it. And there may be some underlying things of what they're saying, but they're they're not seeing the bigger picture. We are the problem human beings. We have to wash our hands. We have to keep from you know, monkey pox is a transmittable disease by touching someone, by having sex with someone that has obviously bumps that don't look, you know, normal on a person, but yet, we're still engaging in some type of way. And yes, it is, you know, has started in Africa, but we know that covid started in China, and we know that it could get around the world. So as human beings, we just have to learn our lessons, and we have to be better going forward.

Unknown Speaker 24:24
I think that's so important. So I always want to make sure it's it is a message that resonates, a message that permeates. Because I'm just sitting here thinking, are we always going to be in this space of thinking about it, and then as we watch the politics of our country change, and I rarely go down the rabbit hole of politics too much, but black maternal health comes to my mind, and we have to. We may not get to get deep into that today, but yeah, it's to me, tied, in a way, to the political space that we have in this country. Oh, absolutely. You know of women's rights working on us. Care. You know, reproductive rights and IVF rights and family expansion rights and things of that nature, and black maternal health is in that space for a popular for that particular population of color, and how it hearing some of the stories as it's become so so front and center. It was surprised to realize that women are going through what they're going through as they deal with this I remember reading a book Lean In Sheryl Sandberg, and she just one of the things that resonated with me in this book was women don't ask. They cope a lot of times. And so instead of voicing what they need in the workspace, wherever the plate, the space that they may be in, instead of asking for what they need, they cope. But before, I need your social media handles, because we're getting into the last couple minutes, and I want people to be able to follow all the good information that you put out and just keep up with what you're doing. So got some social

Unknown Speaker 26:01
for So, yeah, they can follow me on LinkedIn, that's where I post most of the educational information. And it's just Alisa Howard, a l, i s a last name, Howard. And then on Instagram, I post some things on there as well, because I know that's where most people are, you know, enjoying their, you know, pictures and things of that nature. But I try to drop some educational moments. And so that one is one, the number one, and then Alisa Howard, all one word, and then on Twitter. Twitter, sometimes I'll go on there and I'll be like, Okay, if people aren't on Instagram, let me see if they're on Twitter. And so it's one, Alisa Howard on Twitter as

Unknown Speaker 26:35
well. And is there a Facebook space, or is that something you do a little differently?

Unknown Speaker 26:40
Facebook is minority health consultants. So they can follow my business page. They can also follow minority health consultants on LinkedIn and Instagram as well. If they that's strictly all you know, just kind of like business education. But if they want to follow me personally, to see who I am and kind of what I do in my my thoughts, they can follow me to other pages. And

Unknown Speaker 27:01
I do want to encourage folks to look you up on Facebook and look at your minority health consultants Facebook page. And I say that because if you are ever in the city going, Oh, I'm just looking for something to do, Elisa posts a lot of really interesting and informative information activities and events that are going on, things that I think anyone everyone would enjoy, from book fairs to walk challenges to just interesting conversations conferences that are coming up around the country. So if you are looking to get more out of the health space, to get healthier, to just get smarter, she is a wealth of information, and her Facebook platform is a great way to stay informed about those types of things. Elisa, I want to thank you. You're welcome, and I want to say thank you for getting up this morning and spending some time with me. It's been great to learn more about you, the mindset you have behind this. I've always known what you do when I watched you in covid, educating people. And I think we worked on a couple of things together as well, we did well to the listening audience. Thank you as well for tuning in this morning to the scoop here on Kun V 91.5 jazz and more. I am so glad to have you, and I hope you found this conversation to be entertaining and enlightening, as I have been joined by the beautiful Alyssa Howard until we meet again next week. Stay healthy, stay hydrated, stay blessed, and have a great day and a wonderful week. I want to thank you for tuning in to the scoop with me. Tonya Flanagan and I want to invite you to get social with me. I'm on Facebook and Twitter. My name is my handle, T, a n, y a F, l, a n, a G, A N. You can also find me on Instagram at Tanya almond eyes Flanagan, and if you have a thought, an opinion or a suggestion, don't hesitate to shoot me an email to tanya.flanagan@unlv.edu Thanks again for joining in. Stay safe and have a great week. You.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai