Finger Lakes Health Systems Agency congratulates the United Way of Greater Rochester for its choice of Fran Weisberg as president and CEO. The agency also thanks Peter Carpino for a decade of service to the United Way, during which time he worked collaboratively with the FLHSA.

Weisberg served as FLHSA’s executive director from 2006 until 2013, a period of dramatic growth for the agency and renewed interest in regional health planning at the state and national level.

“Fran has a proven ability to bring people together for the good of the community,” said Trilby de Jung, chief executive officer for FLHSA. “During her FLHSA tenure, she engaged leaders from business, government, insurance, hospitals, consumers and other community groups and more important, kept them at the table for meaningful agreement around health planning.”

Ultimately, that unusual level of communitywide consensus led to the region receiving $26.6 million in federal funding for innovation in primary care delivery—the largest such grant awarded in the nation, de Jung said.

Weisberg’s ability to mobilize community partners around common health goals gained state recognition as well, explained Wade Norwood, chief program officer for FLHSA. “Her legacy is that today, the state is replicating across New York this same model of regional health planning through its new Population Health Improvement Program, which aims to provide better care and lower costs.”

Dr. Michael Nazar, FLHSA board chair and executive vice president, Rochester Regional Health System, chief of medical groups, said one of Fran’s strengths was in connecting health care with human services to prevent disease.

“Having her at the United Way strengthens the link between health and human services, which is critical for helping people stay healthy,” said Dr. Nazar.