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About Maria Julian

Maria Julian is Executive Director at Counter Tools. Maria began her public health career at the Alcohol, Drug and Mental Health Board of Franklin County, Ohio in 2006. From startups to local governments in the U.S. and abroad, Maria has led teams through the implementation of behavior change strategies to improve health outcomes. Maria earned her Master of Public Administration from Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. She enjoys sending snail mail and being outside with her partner, sons, and dog.

Webinar recording on derived psychoactive cannabis products

Derived psychoactive cannabis products (DPCPs) have rapidly become available in retail outlets across the U.S. since the 2018 U.S. Agriculture Improvement Act (also known as the Farm Bill) implicitly legalized the product and sale of these products. DPCPs are regulated as “hemp”; there are currently no federal [More]

By |2024-04-26T12:21:13-04:00April 26, 2024|Categories: Uncategorized|

Webinar: Environmental Scans for Alcohol Policy Change with the Alcohol Policy Resource Center

We are excited to announce a collaborative webinar with the Alcohol Policy Resource Center. The Environmental Scans for Alcohol Policy Change webinar will be on Wednesday, November 8th, from 2:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. Eastern. Assessing your community is critical in identifying potential issues contributing to [More]

By |2023-10-18T11:53:34-04:00October 18, 2023|Categories: Alcohol, Data, Partners, Webinars|

Counter Tools celebrates our 10th anniversary

As Counter Tools celebrates our 10th anniversary, we’re reflecting on the partnerships that sparked community change in the retail environment and looking forward to our ambitious goals to address health equity and empower communities to become healthier places for all. Where we’ve been Over the past [More]

By |2022-12-23T13:16:57-05:00December 23, 2022|Categories: News From Tools|

Call to action on home delivery of alcohol by USPS

Counter Tools joins the American Public Health Association’s Alcohol Action Network in urging congressional action on home delivery of alcohol by the US Postal Service.  By law, the US Postal Service is prohibited from shipping alcohol under U.S. Legal Code 18 § 1716. But a new [More]

By |2023-08-01T13:39:22-04:00October 11, 2022|Categories: Advocacy|

A Moment of victory: FDA moves to ban menthol cigarettes and flavored cigars

The Biden Administration’s announcement yesterday that the FDA will take action to prohibit menthol cigarettes and flavored cigars is a long-awaited victory that will advance health equity and protect health for all, especially for Black Americans and kids. We celebrate the originators of this movement and [More]

By |2021-05-06T11:08:57-04:00April 30, 2021|Categories: Health Equity, Point of Sale, Policy|

Considering social vulnerability and health equity in COVID-19 vaccine allocation

Health equity is being considered in discussions of vaccine allocation for perhaps the first time in our history. Official recommendations for vaccine distribution may include the CDC’s Social Vulnerability Index as a way of incorporating the disproportionate impacts of COVID-19 on certain communities into determination of [More]

By |2021-08-05T16:46:34-04:00December 2, 2020|Categories: Data, Health Equity, Housing|

Counter Tools featured in Innovate Carolina’s newsletter!

We're thrilled to be featured in Innovate Carolina's weekly newsletter, IN the Know! IN the Know shares interesting and inspiring news and updates about innovative and entrepreneurial activity at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which is where we were founded seven years ago.

By |2019-06-24T14:43:11-04:00June 4, 2019|Categories: News From Tools|

[UPDATED!] See you at NCTOH!

Counter Tools will be at the National Conference on Tobacco or Health (NCTOH) August 27th to 29th in Minneapolis, MN---will you? During the conference, we invite you to stop by our exhibitor booth (#111) to grab some promotional materials and talk further with us about our [More]

By |2019-06-24T14:43:51-04:00April 19, 2019|Categories: News From Tools|

My Place: That’s So ‘South of Shaw’

"My Place" is a series of blog posts authored by the Counter Tools team that aims to shed light on the impact place has had on each of our lives. In this My Place post, we hear from Executive Director Nina Baltierra. I grew up in [More]

By |2021-08-05T16:35:11-04:00February 15, 2019|Categories: Health Equity, Housing|

Happy Year of Cessation

As with all new years, there has been a lot of talk about resolutions. Maybe you’ve set some goals for yourself or seen the evidence of resolution motivation in the form of lines for the treadmills at the gym or friends taking rain-checks on drinks because [More]

By |2020-05-20T14:23:42-04:00January 11, 2019|Categories: Policy|

Big Data For Big Good

In this post, Anna Davidson, our Director of Product & Technology, reflects on Big Data and the Internet of Things, and how we can use them for good. While attending a keynote at a recent geospatial health and human services conference, I asked the speaker, 1) [More]

By |2021-08-05T16:37:48-04:00December 21, 2018|Categories: Data|

Getting to Know Your Place Using Data

Happy Thanksgiving! In this post, Project Director Marielle Matthews is ravenous for Census data. I’ve always been captivated by Census data. Attempting to count every person everywhere in the United States and Puerto Rico?! That’s daunting. Even though carrying out such a massive data collection project [More]

By |2021-08-05T16:39:06-04:00November 20, 2018|Categories: Data|

Reflections on Place and Safety

Last weekend, the US saw the worst mass murder of Jewish people in its history with a shooting at the Tree of Life Or L’Simcha Synagogue in Pittsburgh, PA. Just days before, a man in Kentucky shot and killed two black men at a grocery store [More]

By |2019-03-18T17:18:32-04:00November 2, 2018|Categories: Health Equity|

My Place: The Stories that Speak the Loudest

"My Place" is a series of blog posts authored by the Counter Tools team that aims to shed light on the impact place has had on each of our lives. In this inaugural My Place post, we hear from Senior Project Director, Charla Rios (Hodges). Being [More]

By |2021-08-05T16:41:44-04:00September 20, 2018|Categories: Data|
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