Melissa Jones
Melissa Jones, MPA, is a racial justice leader with 20 years of experience at the intersection of health equity, community development, and racial justice. She specializes in efforts to drive public and private resources to communities most impacted by racial and economic injustice, with a particular focus on Black communities; sometimes working for municipal government and sometimes as an outside partner.
Melissa is the Executive Director of Bay Area Regional Health Inequities Initiative (BARHII), the coalition of the Bay Area's governmental public health departments. She has led the organization's transition from a training centre to a public policy organisation with an explicit focus on racial and health justice for the African American, Pacific Islander, and Indigenous communities, tripling the size of the organization to respond more fully to community needs and adding a coalition of community organizations to guide the work. During the COVID-19 pandemic, BARHII served as the region's health equity advocate, facilitating eviction moratoriums in every county to prevent new waves of homelessness, convening health and parks directors to keep parks open safely and reverse closures, issuing guidance on protection for essential workers, and supporting new cash aid programs. Melissa’s current work focuses on equitable economic recovery.
Before joining BARHII, Melissa served as Senior Program Officer at Local Initiative Support Corporation (LISC), where she launched and ran Boston LISC’s Resilient Communities Resilient Families (RCRF) Initiative. The 10-year initiative worked to ensure that residents of Boston’s largest Black neighbourhoods benefit from the rising tide of transit and other public investments. The initiative created thousands of units of affordable housing, new schools and business incubators, and engaged thousands in community projects. Melissa was awarded the LISC President's award for her efforts, and later became a Center for Community Investment Fulcrum Fellow.
Melissa's success builds on her early life experiences, which taught her that love, safety, and transformation come through holistic support to families. As a result, her professional journey has always been focused on working across silos and understanding the connections between issues.
She has a special interest in youth empowerment and has spent several decades as a youth leader turned program manager and funder of youth programs.