District Director of Health Gregg Pane will run the agency’s HIV and AIDS programs on an interim basis following the resignation of program
administrator Marsha Martin earlier this week, spokeswoman Leila Abrar said.
Martin, who had been lauded as someone who could put the District’s AIDS and HIV programs on track in the face of what several officials have referred to as an epidemic, resigned earlier this week after Mayor Adrian Fenty failed to ask her to return to her position in his incoming administration. She was appointed to the spot, which she held for sixteen months, by former Mayor Anthony Williams.
“As a Williams appointee, it is my time to leave the government, and I do so with great respect and admiration for this agency,” Martin wrote to staff members in an e-mail. “Together, you have changed and re-ignited the conversation about the HIV epidemic in Washington, DC.”
In the District, where it is estimated that 1 in 20 people have HIV or AIDS, Martin was one of at least three people to come and go in the troubled HIV/AIDS agency in past years.
Donald Blanchon, chief executive officer of Whitman-Walker Clinic, said in a statement released earlier this week that Martin was always “accessible, engaged and always thinking creatively about to resolve the problem of HIV and AIDS not only in D.C. but in the world.”
“Martin was also a strong supporter of Whitman-Walker Clinic, and relations between both our organizations improved dramatically when she came on board,” Blanchon wrote.
Blanchon met with Fenty’s transition team to discuss the District’s handling of HIV/AIDS policy before he took office, Whitman-Walker spokeswoman Kim Mills said Friday.
“We’re optimistic that we’re going to have a great relationship,” Mills said. “From all appearances, the mayor is committed to solving the HIV and
AIDS crisis.”
