People On The Move

PeoplesBank announced the appointment of Tracy Sicbaldi as assistant vice president, Commercial and Institutional Banking. She has more than 35 years of financial-services and banking experience. In her new position, she will identify, develop, and manage new municipal, commercial, and institutional deposit relationships. Sicbaldi is the former treasurer of the towns of Hampden and Monson. She is a member of the Massachusetts Collectors and Treasurers Assoc., the Hampden County Collectors and Treasurers Assoc., the Hampshire and Franklin Collectors and Treasurers Assoc., and the Worcester County Collectors and Treasurers Assoc. She is a former member of the Eastern Mass Treasurers and Collectors Assoc. and attended all educational state and county municipal meetings. Her professional volunteer service includes serving as treasurer, vice president, and president of the Professional Women’s Chamber; the finance chair of the Rays of Hope steering committee; and a past board member of the Affiliated Chambers of Commerce of Greater Springfield (ACCGS) and the YWCA of Western Massachusetts.

•••••

Florence Bank promoted Jeanne Woods to the position of assistant vice president and branch manager for the bank’s Amherst location. Woods joined Florence Bank in 2001 and previously served as assistant branch manager of the Amherst office. She is a development committee member for the Amherst Survival Center. “We are thrilled to announce the promotion of Jeanne Woods,” said Florence Bank President and CEO John Heaps Jr. “She is a dedicated and valued employee who consistently delivers great results. She has been an asset to the bank for many years, and I look forward to watching her progress even further in the years to come.”

•••••

Viability Inc. announced that Lynn Ostrowski-Ireland has been appointed chief operating officer, a new position within Viability, reporting directly to President and CEO Dick Venne. As COO, Ostrowski-Ireland will be responsible for overseeing the operation of Viability’s programs and services across the 36 locations in five states in which it currently operates. Ostrowski-Ireland is the former executive director of the National Aetna Foundation, where she led strategic grants and programs and enterprise-wide corporate social-responsibility strategy and reporting. She also held numerous leadership positions at Health New England, including director of Marketing, Communications and Brand, director of Community Relations and Health Programs, and director of Corporate Responsibility & Government Affairs. She is recognized for her expertise in population health and addressing social determinants of health, and has addressed national audiences on many public-health topics, most recently keynoting at the National Cancer Foundation and the National Oncology Nurses Congress. Ostrowski-Ireland has achieved several certificates of advanced study from Harvard Business School of Executive Education as well as Johns Hopkins University. She holds a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree from Springfield College, and a Ph.D. from Capella University. She was honored at the 2017 Bay Path University Women’s Leadership Conference and inducted into the Bay Path University Women’s Leadership Hall of Fame.

•••••

The board of directors of the Ludlow Community Center/Randall Boys & Girls Club announced that Mechilia “Chile” Salazar has accepted the role of president and CEO of the center. Salazar previously served as executive director of the Boys and Girls Club of Middlesex County in Somerville. Her experience also includes positions as chief Development officer of the Base in Roxbury and Room to Grow in Boston. “I am excited to join such a committed group of leaders at the Randall Boys & Girls Club and build on the best of the team and organization,” she said. “I look forward to working relentlessly to ensure that the club continues to be a positive place where every young person feels loved, knows that they matter, and has access to the resources and opportunities to succeed. I am excited about harnessing the strength of this tight-knit community that has helped make the culture in and outside the club great.”

•••••

Disability-rights activist Chris Palames is the recipient of this year’s Distinguished Service Award from Holyoke Community College. Palames is the founder of the Stavros Center for Independent Living in Amherst, executive director of Independent Living Resources in Florence, and a retired consultant for the Massachusetts Division of Capital and Asset Management, which manages construction projects for publicly owned facilities in the state. He has served on the Northampton Commission on Disability and the Massachusetts Disability Policy Consortium, and frequently advises the staff in HCC’s Office for Students with Disabilities and Deaf Services. HCC President Christina Royal presented the Distinguished Service Award to Palames at HCC’s 71st commencement ceremony at the MassMutual Center in Springfield on June 2. Palames began his life as an activist as a freshman at Wesleyan University in the 1960s, demonstrating for civil rights on the White House lawn. A spinal-cord injury left him a quadriplegic, but, after a year recuperating, he was back, protesting the Vietnam War and completing his bachelor’s degree in psychology.

•••••

Dr. Mark Keroack, president and CEO of Baystate Health, is the 78th chair of the Massachusetts Health & Hospital Assoc. board of trustees. He succeeds Kate Walsh, president and CEO of Boston Medical Center. In his inaugural address, Keroack discussed his deep interest in the major policy proposals and other efforts now underway to advance healthcare both statewide and nationally. He also acknowledged that many of these endeavors are currently overshadowed by disruptive challenges buffeting hospitals, health systems, and other care providers. “We must reconnect with our core purpose, to remind both our team members and our communities of who we are and what we have always been,” he said. “We need to remind ourselves of our history of being there for our communities for generations, reliably serving all those who need our help, innovating, and caring for the person and not just the disease. And as we step up, as we find our voice, I believe we will learn something about ourselves and what we share in common.”

•••••

Brooke Hallowell, dean of the Springfield College School of Health Sciences and Rehabilitation Studies, was one of 14 signatories for international associations that founded the initiative of the Global Rehabilitation Alliance (GRA), which gathered for the first time on May 22 at the World Health Assembly hosted by the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva. Hallowell will continue to serve as a founding representative to the Global Rehabilitation Alliance for the next three years. The alliance will be a platform for united advocacy and awareness-raising to strengthen rehabilitation in health and social systems around the world. Many organizations serve this goal through working to improve accessibility to services, quality of care, the building of rehabilitation workforce capacity, and strengthening of data collection. The Global Rehabilitation Alliance will aim to further these efforts through raising the profile of rehabilitation and strengthening networks and partnerships. Hallowell has a global reputation in collaborative development of rehabilitation services and frameworks, especially in under-resourced regions. Most recently, she held adjunct faculty appointments and visiting professorships at universities in Korea, Malaysia, and Honduras. She is involved in current research, educational, and clinical program collaboration in Malaysia, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Vietnam, Russia, and Honduras.