This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

What was the situation in Maryland?

In Maryland, we’ve had a chronic shortage of Environmental Health Specialists, and that has put potentially some of our critical work we do at risk of not getting done in as timely of a fashion. Environmental Health Specialists provide critical public health functions in Maryland and across the nation. They do things like conduct food inspections, they make sure that the water we drink and the water we swim in is safe, they control vectors like mosquitoes and ticks…so they really are working to ensure that our environment is safe for us to live, work, and play.

How have you been able to use PHIG funding?

We have used the Public Health Infrastructure Grant, for which we are so grateful, to address this shortage by launching a first-in-the-nation Environmental Health Specialist Apprenticeship Program. This program was designed, developed, and launched in partnership with many partners across the state, including our Department of Labor and Morgan State University, a historically Black university.

The apprenticeship program is a registered apprenticeship in Maryland, and we have apprentices who have started in July 2025, and we’re really excited that the first cohort has started. So we have two apprentices who have started in this first cohort. They are employees of the Maryland Department of Health, but they will also be taking courses at Morgan State University and learning on the job. And at the end of this, they will be able to sit the exam to become licensed Environmental Health Specialists.

What’s the projected impact of this work?

In Maryland, we have the state health department, but we also have 24 local health departments, and we have Environmental Health Specialists that work in each of those. So over the course of the apprenticeship, the apprentices will be working in those health departments as well as in other state agencies to really learn the breadth of what environmental health practice is all about.

At the end of this, they’ll be working in local health departments, directly serving the community served by those local health departments, ensuring that the food is safe, the water is safe, the vectors are controlled, and really taking care of their communities.

Why is this kind of investment so important?

This Public Health Infrastructure Grant is a game-changer. It has been so foundational to all of public health service delivery in Maryland. In particular, we’re talking about the Environmental Health Specialist Apprenticeship Program here, but broadly across Maryland, it’s helped us improve communications, support our workforce, and modernize our data systems. This investment has been so meaningful for us, and I would certainly welcome the opportunity to continue it in the future.