Penny Ballem

Member, VANOC Board of Directors
Nominated by the City of Vancouver

Dr. Penny Ballem is the city manager for the City of Vancouver and currently serves as a corporate director for Bentall Capital G.P. Ltd., as well as a senior adviser to RPO Management Consultants.

Trained as a clinical hematologist, Dr. Ballem has more than 30 years experience in the public sector in Canada in senior management positions. She served as deputy minister of health for British Columbia from 2001 to 2006, as well as the vice-president of women’s and family health at the Children’s and Women’s Health Centre of BC.

As deputy minister of health, Dr. Ballem served as the lead official for a number of specific national health initiatives led by the premier of British Columbia, including the National Pharmaceutical Strategy and the Aboriginal Health Strategy. She also oversaw the move to a fully regionalized system (from 52 governing bodies to six health authorities) with consolidation of regional service delivery and development of core health service capacity in each region to better serve the public.

She also oversaw a major transformation of the public drug plan (Pharmacare) to ensure more equitable access for all British Columbians and improved labour relations in the health system with an unprecedented agreement with all labour unions to work on health policy and health workplace issues through the terms of new agreements commencing in March 2006.

Dr. Ballem is the winner of the 2003 Queen’s Jubilee Medal for Public Service, as well as the 2006 British Columbia Provincial Health Officer’s Award for Leadership in Public Health.