- April 28, 2024
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Flagler Cares' Jeannette Simmons, left, and Carrie Baird, right, with Dr. Stephen Bickel outside of the Flagler Cares office at Flagler County Village in City Market Place. Photo by Brent Woronoff
Flagler Cares' Jeannette Simmons, left, and Carrie Baird, right, with Dr. Stephen Bickel. Photo by Brent Woronoff
Dr. Stephen Bickel is donating $1 million a year to Flagler Cares for 10 years, which will be followed by an endowment that will be worth at least another $10 million. File photo
Dr. Stephen Bickel remembers when Flagler Cares was a tiny organization with big ambitions to provide a safety net of health and social services for the neediest people of Flagler County.
Thanks to Bickel, Flagler Cares now has the resources to match its ambitions.
Bickel has announced a $1 million a year donation for each of the next 10 years to the organization. At the end of the 10 years, said Bickel, there will be an endowment that will be worth at least another $10 million.
Bickel, 72, isn't just handing over money. He'll be hands on as long as he can. He is one of four members of the board of directors of Flagler Cares who are on the finance committee overseeing the funds. The others are board president DJ Lebo, DOH-Flagler administrator Bob Snyder and board secretary Barbara Revels. Executive Director Carrie Baird, who has been with Flagler Cares since its inception, is also on the committee, along with Chief Operating Officer Rachael Gerow and Chief Innovation Officer Jeannette Simmons.
"It's amazing what he's doing, and when you hear him talk about it, you hear the excitement in his voice. He's just truly excited about being able to gift this to the community."
RACHEL GEROW, Flagler Cares chief operating officer
"We're actually going to try to raise money in addition to mine and sort of transform our organization," Bickel said.
Since Bickel informed Flagler Cares of his intentions about six to eight months ago, the organization grew its staff to 13 employees.
"Steve encouraged us to staff up," Baird said. "It's a little crazy. Three years ago we had a staff of three."
Through its most recent community health needs assessment, Flagler Cares has been focusing on five areas of need in the county: mental health care, substance abuse treatment, affordable housing, early childhood development and food insecurity.
The official start of Bickel's "Flagler Catalyst Fund" began July 1 with the initial focus on mental health, telehealth.
"There's just a dearth of mental health services for uninsured patients, even for insured patients, in Flagler County," Bickel said.
Flagler Cares has an agreement with IMPOWER, a telehealth provider for mental health needs and substance abuse. It also has an agreement with A Plus Pharmacy in Bunnell to provide medication assistance for the uninsured or underinsured, "because what's the point of providing access to a psychiatrist if they can't get access to the medication," Simmons said.
Flagler Cares is also putting together a medication assisted treatment program for opioid users, Bickel said.
Bickel said the mental health focus will account for one-third of his first $1 million donation. Building up staff is another third.
"We figured if we raise outside funds, we want to be able to say to people, we will take none of your money for our own uses. If you donate money to us to be given out, we will absorb all the overhead."
The final third is providing grants to other organizations.
"There's this concept of social entrepreneurship where you take the best practices of the venture capital approach to business development and apply it to the social safety net sphere," Bickel said. "So instead of trying to make money, we're trying to help build organizations that have a strategy and some path to sustainability."
They started taking proposals on July 5, Baird said.
Simmons and Gerow were lured to the organization earlier this year when they heard about Bickel's plans.
"It's so unusual that it's still mind blowing to me," said Simmons, a licensed mental health counselor. "I'm used to very formal ways of receiving funding, either through grants or other types that come with a lot of stipulations. To know that we can do whatever we want and be creative and solution focused is a dream come true personally for me."
Said Gerow: "It's amazing what he's doing, and when you hear him talk about it, you hear the excitement in his voice. He's just truly excited about being able to gift this to the community."
FOCUSED ON FLAGLER
Bickel grew up in Chicago and practiced medicine for 30-plus years in Los Angeles. He retired to Flagler County in 2011 after visiting his childhood friend, Dr. Steve Playe, and his wife, Ann, who live in the Hammock.
"I thought, wow, this is like a diamond in the rough, a little paradise," he said. "To me, it's a pretty special place."
He's been working part-time as the medical director of DOH-Flagler for the past six or seven years. He volunteered at the Flagler County Free Clinic for about five years, and while he was there he got involved with Flagler Cares.
"I was on the planning committee and we were coming up with the ideas," he said. "It grew from a fledgling little organization. We've had a kind of different orientation from the beginning. We never view ourselves as being focused on one particular activity. It was more we wanted to find gaps of service or just ecosystem kind of deficiencies or new approaches to things to make a more complete package of network services available inside the county. We've always been focused on Flagler County."
"It's maybe somewhat of an obsession. It's hard to describe why I'm so into it. I just find it fascinating. It's somewhat resembles medicine. Trying to figure out the whole macro-financial arena is kind of like a diagnosis challenge."
DR. STEPHEN BICKEL
Meanwhile, another little hobby of Bickel's was investing.
"I guess, it's more than a hobby now," he said. "It's maybe somewhat of an obsession. It's hard to describe why I'm so into it. I just find it fascinating. It's somewhat resembles medicine. Trying to figure out the whole macro-financial arena is kind of like a diagnosis challenge."
He got seriously into investing about five years ago, which was just about the time the stock market soared. Bickel began realizing that he had enough money to make a difference. Perhaps, start a foundation, he thought. He talked to Snyder, his health department colleague, who knew about the restrictions and paperwork such an endeavor would entail.
"I went back to estate planning, and I came to the conclusion that Flagler Cares was a better way to achieve all the philanthropic goals I have, because I wanted it to be a locally focused foundation," Bickel said. "They can have a grant-making committee and also deliver programs themselves. Then I realized it wasn't helping the organization if I gave them $10 million sometime in the future. So, I decided to start funding it now, and it will transition into an endowment."
Simmons said she loves when Bickel calls and throws ideas out.
"I strive everyday to uphold the principles of servant leadership with that entrepreneurial spirit, and he is such an excellent example of that," she said. "So for me, it's just personally exciting to work with a person like Dr. Bickel."
