CHARLOTTE, N.C. _ Over four decades in health care, Gibbie Harris has managed many crises, both large and small.
In Wake County, N.C., it was a growing HIV-AIDS epidemic and hurricane refugees. At a Hospice center in Lenoir, it was offering comfort to grieving families.
But never has Harris faced a crisis like this.
As Mecklenburg County's health director, she's become the face of the local government response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Elected officials follow her lead and heed her advice. It was her recommendation that made Mecklenburg the second county in the state to order residents to stay home.
"She's probably the most powerful person in our community right now," said Susan Harden, a county commissioner. "The buck stops with her."
Harris, 67, is an unlikely powerhouse.
She holds a job that, barring controversy or contagions, gets little public attention. The department oversees everything from breast cancer screenings to immunizations to tattoo parlors. Although now a fixture at county news conferences, Harris feels more at home behind the scenes.
"That's how I like to get work done," she told The Observer in an interview this week. "But I will step up when I need to. This has turned out to be one of those situations where I've needed to."
In 2017, after being brought in as a consultant to examine the county's troubled health department, Harris was hired to replace the director who was under fire for what the county called leadership failures. Before that she led health departments in Wake County and then in Buncombe, where in 2011 she was named North Carolina's Health Director of the Year.
Former colleagues describe Harris as smart, thoughtful and passionate about public health. She's also measured, driven by facts and data and able to communicate them.
"Gibbie's a good problem solver," said Dorothy Cilenti, her former partner in a consulting company. "She works well under pressure."
In a pandemic often defined by statistics, Harris can't forget what's behind the numbers.
This month, in a virtual presentation to a health committee of the N.C. House, she was going through a PowerPoint full of figures and charts detailing the COVID-19 outbreak in Mecklenburg. When she came to a slide titled "How Bad Could This Get?" she hesitated. Her voice choked. Her eyes clouded with tears.
Rep. Donna White, a Johnston County Republican who chairs the committee and is herself a former nurse, called Harris's reaction a "powerful moment" that "made it real for all of us."
"The Gibbie I know has always been the logical, very firm lady, just very procedural," White said. "The Gibbie that I saw on the (video) was a real nurse ... Her face, her reaction demonstrated the fact that nurses are not just directors of public health, they feel the pain."
Harris said later that the magnitude of the crisis got to her.
"This situation involves many people getting ill, potentially dying," she said. "I see the wear and tear in people's faces ... There are times when it hits you how big and broad and potentially devastating this is. We are human, right?"
From candy-striper to health director
Harris grew up in Statesville. Her grandfather and uncle were doctors. In high school she volunteered as a candy-striper at Iredell Memorial. When allergies and asthma killed her dream of becoming a veterinarian, she went to UNC Chapel Hill to study nursing.
After school, she worked as a nurse in Wilkes County and then helped start the Hospice Center in Lenoir, where she worked for seven years. She was not only the executive director and nurse but de facto grief counselor, social worker and volunteer coordinator.
After returning to Chapel Hill for a masters in public health, she went to work in Wake County, first with a non-profit working with HIV-AIDS patients then with the county.
Peter Morris, executive director of Urban Ministries of Wake County, worked with Harris at the county's human services department. One of the first things she did, he said, was bring UNC health care professionals in to conduct clinical trials with AIDS patients. It was, he said, "a marvel of collaboration."
"Its hard to remember the stigma that HIV carried at that time and the fear," Morris said. "Yet Gibbie was able to say 'This is something we need to address'... and treat it."
She rose to become county health director before leaving in 2009 for a similar position in Buncombe County, in part to be closer to the mountains and her husband's family.
There she helped bring together more than 70 organizations in an effort to improve health in the county. It included initiatives to fight obesity and asthma, reduce secondhand smoke exposure and fight childhood poverty. In 2014 the effort was recognized with an award from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
"Gibbie was really good at connecting the dots ... and bringing together government entities, non-profits and businesses," said Paul Vest, president and CEO of the YMCA of Western North Carolina and a leader in the effort. "It was really a big picture approach to a community health-related issue."
In 2015 Harris went into business as a consultant with Cilenti and three other public health professionals. That's how she came to the attention of Mecklenburg County Manager Dena Diorio.
County hires Praxis
In 2017 Diorio hired Harris's firm, Praxis Partners, to evaluate the troubled health department, under scrutiny for failing to notify women who had abnormal Pap smears. Four months later the county hired Harris as interim health director.
Two commissioners, Democrat Pat Cotham and Republican Jim Puckett, questioned whether it was a conflict of interest. Puckett called it "horrible optics." Later that year Diorio made the hire permanent.
"Gibbie is a true public health professional who has brought competency, leadership, respect and trust to the organization," Diorio said this week in a statement.
Bobby Cobb, a former deputy director with the health department, said Harris is easy to work with.
"She understands the value of having good solid leadership in the organization," he said. "And she's able to tap into those people. She relies on her managers."
Harris has had her stumbles.
At a 2017 meeting of county commissioners, she made a presentation on Charlotte's relatively high HIV rate. The city, she said, "can be a party town."
"It can be a place where people come in, enjoy themselves for the weekend, and then leave but leave stuff behind," she said.
LGBTQ advocates blasted the comments. Harris apologized, acknowledging that "words matter."
With the LGBTQ community and a coalition of community leaders, she helped develop a plan to reduce HIV infections that included a pilot program aimed at helping those at high risk for acquiring HIV.
"After that incident Gibbie really stepped up and responded to a lot of concerns in the community and dove head first into creating better plans for HIV awareness and prevention," said Matt Comer, communications director for Charlotte Pride. "There were lots of good things that came from that."
'Don't have all the data'
In 2006, Harris was in charge of Wake County's emergency shelter for victims of Hurricane Katrina. In most health emergencies, she said, she could see an end. In a hurricane, the wind finally stops, the waters recede and people return home.
"This is quite different," she said of the coronavirus. "We're learning as we go. We don't have all the data we need to understand fully what to expect."
Harris still lives with her husband in the hills just south of Asheville, not far from her daughter and grandchildren. She rents an apartment in Charlotte.
Working as much as 15 hours a day, she hasn't been able to get back home since February. She said that's the hardest personal challenge. "My family," she said, "provides me with energy and support."
When she can she walks or reads. Her preferred recreational reading? Science fiction and fantasy.
"Witches, warlocks and dragons are a pretty good escape," she said.
