Greater than 600 visitors gathered at Loews Miami Seashore Lodge because the Jackson Well being Basis used its annual Golden Angels Gala to highlight a significant management transition and continued funding in Miami-Dade’s public well being system.
The night marked one of many last public moments for longtime CEO Carlos Migoya, who will step down on the finish of Could after 15 years main Jackson Well being System. In a program that balanced recognition with ahead momentum, the Basis launched his successor, present president and COO David Zambrana, signaling a management handoff at a pivotal time for the system.
It additionally launched what’s going to change into a long-lasting a part of Migoya’s legacy: the Carlos A. Migoya Affected person Care Tower at Jackson Memorial Hospital, set to open later this 12 months.
The gala itself stays one of many Basis’s most vital fundraising drivers, supporting a system that serves because the spine of public well being care within the area. Since its inception, the Basis has raised greater than $265 million, funding all the pieces from capital initiatives to vital affected person care packages. Latest initiatives embrace the enlargement and renovation of the emergency division at Jackson Memorial, anticipated to be among the many largest within the nation.
CEO Flavia Llizo saved the message direct. The energy of Jackson, she emphasised, is tied to the group that continues to put money into it.
That group was nicely represented. Philanthropic leaders, well being care advocates, and longtime supporters—together with Trish and Dan Bell, The José Milton Basis, and FPL—had been acknowledged for his or her function in sustaining and increasing the system’s attain. Their contributions are usually not summary; they immediately impression entry to care throughout Miami-Dade.
The best second of the evening averted institutional language altogether. Eight-year-old Dylan Smith, handled at Holtz Kids’s Hospital after a near-drowning incident, was honored alongside his household. His survival hinged on quick motion—CPR carried out by his dad and mom and a neighbor—and the care he acquired as soon as he arrived at Jackson.
It reframed the night in sensible phrases. The Basis’s work helps infrastructure and innovation, but it surely additionally ensures that when moments like that occur, the system is supplied to reply.
The Golden Angels Gala continues to function at that intersection of philanthropy and necessity. The setting might shift, and the management might evolve, however the focus stays constant: constructing a public well being system that may meet the calls for of a rising and complicated group.
