Sandra Viera, Director
Email: Sandra_at_preventioninstitute_dot_org
Sandra Viera (she/her/ella) serves as a Director at Prevention Institute, co-leading the organization’s Healthy Equitable Communities portfolio of projects involving healthy-equitable land use, health system transformation, and partnerships for prevention. Building on over 15 years of experience supporting capacity building efforts for governmental, non-profit, and philanthropic entities, Sandra manages training and technical assistance strategy for the organization as part of her leadership responsibilities.
As a partner and advisor to the St. Joseph Community Partnership Fund since 2016 , Sandra co-directs the Intersections Initiative, a multi-site, four-year community of practice focused on building the capacity of health system actors and community partners to engage in local policy change to advance health equity. Guided by input from local residents and key stakeholders, the seven Intersections community partnerships are taking on issues as diverse as affordable housing, education, economic and workforce development, immigration, community trauma, and civic engagement. She is a co-author on the brief highlighting key lessons from the first phase of the Initiative, “Building Power and Partnerships for the Future: Insights from the Intersections Initiative” (2023).
In her current role, Sandra directs People, Parks, and Power (P3), the first national funding initiative in the U.S. to support power building by community-based organizations to reverse deep seated park and green space inequities in Black, Latino, and Indigenous communities across the country. P3 is a joint effort of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, led and managed by Prevention Institute. Sandra provides oversight and guidance to a highly skilled team of PI leaders that manage P3’s national grantmaking program, peer learning community, strategic communications, and field-building efforts.
Sandra is a recipient of the prestigious Sarah E. Samuels Award for New Health Professionals, which acknowledges her significant contributions to the field of public health. As part of her work supporting the CDC’s efforts to improve food and activity environments, Sandra contributed to the CDC’s A Practitioner’s Guide to Advancing Health Equity: Community Strategies for Preventing Chronic Disease (2013). The guide highlights equity-oriented strategies to advance prevention through active living, tobacco prevention, and healthy food access. She also contributed to Prevention Institute’s publications Partnering for health equity: Grassroots organizations on collaborating with public health agencies (2018), Walk On: Strategies to Promote Walkable Communities (2013), and the 2011 book, At Risk: Latino Children’s Health.
A Southern California native and resident of Los Angeles County, Sandra is based in PI’s Leimert Park office. She enjoys exploring new playgrounds and parks with her family.