I'm an assistant professor and the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Nebraska Chair of Health Care Administration and Policy in the School of Public Administration at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. I'm also a Senior Researcher and Board President at The Schreiber Research Group. At UNO, I teach courses on public policy and research local community opioid response, disparities in treatment and service availability for people with substance use disorder, and the implementation of medications for opioid use disorder in justice settings. I've also written about collaborative governance, public management, and local sustainable development and previously taught at the University of Colorado Denver School of Public Affairs. I'm from Rhode Island where I earned my BSBA in finance from Bryant University and my MPA from the University of Rhode Island. I then moved to Florida and earned my PhD from the Askew School of Public Administration and Policy at Florida State University. I enjoy sports, nature and animals, films and the performing arts, and spending time with my wife, Serena Kim, our family, and friends.

Research

I study the adoption, implementation, and impacts of policy and programmatic activities aimed at addressing the substance use epidemic in local communities. My research is focused on answering three questions:

What disparities exist in opioid and substance use response activities (treatment, health and social services, justice programs) across rural-urban and racial/ethnic lines, and how can these disparities be eliminated?
What role does collaborative governance play in strengthening local community resilience to the opioid and substance use epidemic?
What impacts do opioid and substance use response policy and programmatic activities have on treatment and health outcomes?

The Health Resources and Services Administration supports my work with The Schreiber Research Group that involves a longitudinal social network analysis and case study of rural community opioid response in Southeast Colorado counties. The Colorado Legislature also supported our work that examined the implementation of medications for opioid use disorder in rural Colorado jails. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Nebraska supports my current research and community outreach activities generally.

I've also published a number of journal articles, book chapters, and reports on collaborative governance, public manangement, and local sustainable development.

Teaching

I teach courses on public policy, social policy, and qualitative research methods at the School of Public Administration in the University of Nebraska at Omaha. Prior to that, I taught quantitative research methods, intergovernmental management, and financial management at the University of Colorado Denver School of Public Affairs where I received the Graduate School Dean’s Doctoral Mentoring Award in 2021. I'm most proud of my contributions as a teacher and mentor to my graduate students who do impactful work in government agencies, nonprofit organizations, and higher education institutions throughout the world.