Team

Alison Yager,  Executive Director

Alison is an attorney with over 20 years of experience in the non-profit and government sectors advocating on behalf of women, children and marginalized individuals.  She comes to Miami from New York, where she served most recently as the Director of Policy Initiatives for Maternal, Infant, and Reproductive Health at the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.  Her work included collaborating with internal and external stakeholders to identify new policy and program initiatives, conducting analyses and developing policy briefs to support the generation of policy initiatives, and advocating for or against enactment of policies at all levels of government.

After graduating from UCLA School of Law’s Program in Public Interest Law and Policy in 2001, Ms. Yager was awarded an Equal Justice Works fellowship to provide legal services to young people at The Door's Legal Service Center in Manhattan, and subsequently worked as a Staff Attorney serving young people experiencing intimate partner violence at Break the Cycle- New York (now Day One).  From 2006 to 2014, Alison worked at HIV Law Project in New York, first as a Staff Attorney and then as Supervising Attorney for HIV Policy.  She began her career as a Community Organizer for the Children’s Defense Fund-NY.

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Miriam Harmatz, Director of Advocacy and Founder

Miriam, one of Florida’s leading Medicaid advocates, is a former senior health law attorney at Florida Legal Services and adjunct professor in the Health Law Clinic at Florida International University College of Law.  She founded the Florida Health Justice Project (FHJP) in late 2017.  

As a young child with a health issue,  Miriam learned that everyone must have insurance and that healthcare is a human right.  She wrote her senior college thesis on why Congress failed to pass a national health insurance bill in 1974, and as a legal services attorney for 30 years she focused on ensuring access to healthcare for her clients.

Miriam has been lead counsel on multiple federal court cases resulting in statewide relief for Medicaid beneficiaries. These successful outcomes, including federal court cases of first impression and with national import, are the result of highly collaborative work with national experts, Florida legal aid lawyers and pro bono attorneys.  On a local level, Miriam led collaborative efforts that improved access and transparency at Miami-Dade County’s publicly funded hospital. This work includes administrative complaints successfully challenging outpatient and inpatient admission deposit policies, discrimination against foreign-born county residents, and violations of consumer protections provided under the Affordable Care Act (ACA),  the first complaint of its kind in the nation.

Because Florida has not yet expanded Medicaid under the ACA, Miriam leads FHJP's collaborative advocacy detailing the tremendous human and economic benefits of extending coverage and the adverse impacts in failing to do so.  

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Katy DeBriere, Legal Director

Katy is one the state's leading experts in Medicaid law. Prior to becoming Legal Director, Katy was the managing attorney for Jacksonville Area Legal Aid’s Northeast Florida Medical Legal Partnership where she secured significant and sustained funding for the partnership for the first time in its 12-year history. Katy also played a lead role in developing a statewide medical-legal partnership network and assisted hundreds of clients with access to Medicaid eligibility and services through individual administrative advocacy. 

Katy began her legal career in 2008 as an Equal Justice Works fellow. The fellowship resulted in several district courts of appeal wins and a successful federal constitutional challenge to Florida’s statutory scheme for the involuntary commitment of individuals with developmental disabilities. The latter case resulted in the amendment of Florida state law to guarantee an annual review of committed individuals. 
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More recently, Katy was responsible for the state's remedial actions to ensure continuous Medicaid enrollment for young people exiting foster care as well as individuals formerly receiving Medicaid through state adoption assistance agreements and Supplemental Security Income. Katy also has experienced litigating individual and systemic matters related to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). 

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Melissa Lipnick, Equal Justice Works Fellow Sponsored by the Florida Bar Foundation

Melissa is an attorney and Equal Justice Works Fellow sponsored by the Florida Bar Foundation. She was awarded a project based fellowship to help low-income Florida seniors access home health care as an alternative to nursing homes. Melissa graduated from the University of Miami School of Law in May 2021. Her enthusiasm for the work done by FHJP stems from her interest in lessening health disparities and her belief that healthcare is a human right. She is passionate about finding ways to overcome the barriers related to accessing healthcare, particularly those access challenges faced by immigrants and those of a lower socio-economic status.

During her second and third years of law school, Melissa was a legal intern and then a fellow at the Health Rights Clinic, focusing on improving access to healthcare for low-income individuals. This was achieved through helping clients gain access to public benefits such as social security or attain legal immigration status. Prior to law school, Melissa served as an AmeriCorps member with City Year Miami, an organization that focused on educational interventions to stop the school to prison pipeline. Melissa has a BS in Public Health from University of Miami.

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​Blanca Mesa, Outreach and Communications Specialist

Blanca is an attorney, journalist, and communication expert.  Blanca, a former Legal Services of Greater Miami public benefits attorney, also worked as the Communications Director for the Mayor of Miami-Dade County.  After the ACA was implemented, she worked as a licensed federal navigator for the ACA health marketplace. She recently helped develop and manage a story bank of over 150 Floridians in the coverage gap willing to speak with the press.

​Blanca has a strong history of public service and community involvement. In 2016, she was named “Best Citizen” by Miami New Times and in 2017, Miami Today newspaper honored her as “Best of Miami” for her community environmental work. Blanca works on documenting the stories of individual low-income Floridians willing to engage on outreach and education regarding Medicaid, as well as other safety net programs that impact the social determinants of health.

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​Shenae Samuels-Staple, Ph.D., Health Policy Research Specialist

Shenae is a research scientist with an expertise in health policy research focused on addressing health disparities and access to care issues among vulnerable populations. Her passion for the work of FHJP stems from the premise that everyone, regardless of their socioeconomic background, deserves access to quality and affordable health care. Her prior research experiences include the Florida Medicaid Reform Evaluation Project, the CDC-funded Florida Office on Disability and Health’s Right To Know Campaign, and the University of Florida Health Disparities and Research Intervention Program. Her research with the Florida Medicaid Reform Evaluation Project led to a co-authorship of the Medicaid Program Flexibility counterpoint in the book, “Debates on U.S. Health Care.” Her doctoral dissertation examined the impact of state Medicaid expansion on access to care and utilization among individuals with ambulatory care sensitive conditions.

Shenae holds a Ph.D. in Health Services Research and a Master of Public Health (MPH) degree with a concentration in Public Health Management and Policy from the University of Florida.

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Jay Jefferson, Multimedia Specialist

​Jay has over 20 years of experience in multimedia production and communication technologies. Having collaborated on various technology projects with numerous colleges and universities throughout New York State as well as the New York State Department of Education, he has served in the roles of Distance Learning Project Manager, Production Manager, Content Manager, Technology Coordinator, Training Facilitator and Education Lobbyist.
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Jay is deeply committed to FHJP’s mission of supporting health care as a human right and the belief that America cannot have health justice without racial justice or racial justice without heath justice.
 
Since moving to Florida, Jay has worked with a variety of clients as an independent consultant in multimedia production and communication technologies. Additionally, he has continued his commitment to education by having served on the Executive Boards and Committees of several non-profit entities throughout Florida and Miami-Dade County; Florida State Parent Teacher Association (PTA), Miami-Dade County Council PTA, African American Children with Learning Disabilities, Coconut Grove Drug Free Community Coalition, and Coconut Grove Ministerial Alliance. Jay’s work in the community earned him the PTA President of the Year Award from the Miami-Dade County Council PTA and Miami-Dade County Public School’s Family of the Year Award.
 
Jay is an alum of New York University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Information Systems Management, a Master of Science in Tourism and Travel Management and obtained a Professional Certificate in Strategic Marketing. During his undergraduate and graduate studies, he was honored with the President’s Service Award for Student Leadership and the Founders’ Academic Scholar Award.

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