San Bernardino County’s public health director, Corwin Porter, officially stepped down to start his retirement at Tuesday's county board of supervisors meeting. KVCR’s Megan Jamerson reports on this and more from the latest county board of supervisors meeting.
Porter said after serving the county for 33 years in various roles, he will now be spending alot of time with eight grandchildren.
“I’ve had the opportunity to serve the residents throughout this county throughout my career and what a blessed opportunity it has been," said Porter. "I feel like maybe I’m leaving a little bit too early, but the timing was actually right for my family and so that ultimately was what resulted in the decision to retire now.”
Porter, who took on the role of director in August 2020 after then director Trudy Raymundo resigned, was praised by the board, including Chairman Curt Hagman, his hard work and dedication during the pandemic.
“You’ve done an outstanding job for us in public health during the probably most challenging times this county has seen in that arena for a century” said Hagman.
Porter’s retirement comes amid more positive COVID news. The county hit a milestone of fully vaccinating more than 200,000 residents this week. Vaccination efforts now include the Johnson & Johnson vaccine says Andrew Goldfrach, COO of Arrowhead Regional Medical Center, who will now serve as interim public health director. He explained that the county plans to use this one dose shot to target groups with access issues.
"One is the homebound and those really hard to reach populations, the second is the homeless populations, and the third is through our mobile clinics, senior centers across all five supervisorial districts,” said Goldfrach.
The latest county COVID data also shows that if San Bernardino can hold in the red tier for three weeks, it could move into the orange reopening tier by early April. In thier tier, some indoor businesses like restaurants can increase capacity, offices can reopen, and bars can start outdoor business.