Norm Kent Takes the Helm at CHC/CenterOne

Express Publisher Norm Kent will soon be wearing another hat.

The 53-year-old attorney and radio talk show host has agreed to become the executive director of Community Health Care/CenterOne (CHC/CenterOne).

“The agency is the oldest and largest HIV service provider in Broward, and it needs to be given a new voice, greater advocacy and more attention,” Kent said.

The announcement was made at a staff meeting last Thursday, and Kent has already assumed the duties.

Kent has a long background with CenterOne, as a former member of its board of directors and as its part-time counsel. He currently is the attorney asserting the privacy interests of patients in Broward circuit court. Kent acknowledged that the transition to executive director at CHC/CenterOne would require that the partners in his law firm assume more of the legal responsibilities.

Born in Brooklyn, New York, Kent is a lifetime member of the National Academy of Criminal Defense Attorneys and the First Amendment Lawyers Association. He has often undertaken the defense of AIDS patients as an integral part of his practice. In 1997, he flew to Key West to successfully defend the AIDS activists who were growing medicinal marijuana for the Key West Buyers Club.

Addressing the staff last week, Kent called upon the employees “to remember that for all the money and medications, treatments and protocols, dreams and aspirations, we are battling a disease that has taken 40,000 hearts and souls from us, with a zero percent cure rate.”

Kent stated that the agency needs to reassert its position in the gay community, develop a senior citizens HIV care center and open a satellite office in the heart of the minority communities “whose AIDS rates are growing exponentially.”

In an impassioned talk, Kent declared, “We have to have the courage to say what we are doing is not enough, as a country, as a community and as an agency. As much as we have done, we still need to do more.”

Asked about the time constraints of the new job, Kent said he will be moving his office to CHC/CenterOne by the end of this week. “We are fortunate, after three years, to have placed a self-sufficient team at The Express—a talented crew of honest salespeople, professional writers and committed individuals who want to see their vision achieved weekly. We will still publish a great paper.”

Kent has also served on the Broward County HIV Services Planning Council and as an adjunct professor at Florida Atlantic University. Kent said CHC/CenterOne needs to “restore its place in our hearts as the focal point of AIDS advocacy, treatment and care.”

Kent is on the air from 8-9am on 1400 AM, WFTL, Monday through Friday. “I intend to do the show every day. It is the only daily regional forum to generate an important discussion of local issues.”

This week, his guests include County Commissioner John Rodstrom, Sun-Sentinel political columnist Buddy Nevins and Fort Lauderdale Police Chief Bruce Roberts.

In the next few months, he said the organization would fund a new development director, more case managers and staff who “will get the word out to anyone and everyone that we are medical care service providers uniquely situated to deal with a national health crisis.”

Steve Steiner, president of CHC/CenterOne's board of directors, said he believed Kent was the perfect person to “take the agency to the next level…. We finally have an articulate, well-known advocate for healthcare, AIDS research and a genuine leader to guide this very important agency.”