Angie Grant, who serves as an administrative officer for the Dare County Department of Health & Human Services, has been named Dare County Employee of the Month for December 2023.
The award was presented to Grant by Dare County Department of Health & Human Services Public Health Nursing Manager Debbie Dutton during the Dare County Board of Commissioners meeting on Monday, December 4, 2023.
Grant began her service to Dare County on June 6, 2016, when she was initially hired to serve as an accounting clerk for the Dare County Department of Health & Human Services.
On June 5, 2017, she was promoted to the position of administrative specialist, and on January 24, 2022 she was promoted once again and took on her current role serving as administrative officer.
In this position, Grant is tasked with a variety of responsibilities that include preparing budgets and supervising budgetary operations; submitting billing claims to insurance companies; reviewing records and working with health care providers to correct any coding inaccuracies; predicting expenditures and preparing budget amendments; serving as clerk to the Dare County Health & Human Services Board; preparing agendas and agenda packets and recording meeting minutes; and preparing, distributing and maintaining all social services contracts, among many other important duties.
“When Angie began, we were only billing Medicaid, Medicare and Blue Cross Blue Shield, but because of her extreme attention to detail and accuracy of the billing process, Angie was promoted to our billing supervisor in January of 2022,” said Dutton. “She was ready for that leadership role and has flourished in her new position.”
During her Employee of the Month presentation, Dutton also noted that Grant took the initiative to contract with MedCost and Cigna, which has allowed the clinic to provide additional services to the community, and that she also worked to finalize a contract with Trillium Health Resources that made it possible for the Dare County Department of Health & Human Services to begin providing essential behavioral health services to patients.
Dutton also highlighted Grant’s efforts to provide guidance throughout Medicaid’s transformation—which expanded a single Medicaid product into a minimum of four different Medicaid products—as well as her dedication to training staff members on how to successfully implement new billing processes and procedures.
“She is truly an expert at her job,” said Dutton. “She is reliable, and she is a team player. She is my go-to person for running numbers for reports through our electronic medical records database when we apply for grants to help sustain our programs that we’re able to offer to our community.”
In addition to Dutton, Grant also received praise for her colleagues, several of whom submitted nomination forms recommending that she receive the prestigious honor of being named Dare County Employee of the Month.
According to one nominator, “Angie is truly and sincerely committed to providing good customer service and real help to all patients. She is courteous, polite, professional, knowledgeable and kind. She is incredibly patient with her coworkers, explaining things, training us and answering a million questions—even if it’s the same one asked over and over. She has a great sense of humor and can maintain a good balance between professionalism and camaraderie.”
Another of Grant’s colleagues noted, “Angie is the unsung hero of what goes on in the clinic. She works behind the scenes so that everything else that is visible runs without a hitch.”
As she concluded her Employee of the Month presentation, Dutton read several comments from staff members who report directly to Grant, stating, “She is level-headed, kind-hearted, quick-witted and a multitasking ninja of the health department. She does so much more than her normal day-to-day tasks. She genuinely cares about her staff and always checks on them, day by day. She will go to bat for you and will speak up about anything she doesn’t necessarily agree with to help to support her staff in the roles that they play. She is a great boss, and we are lucky to have her.”
