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Axis Community Health CEO Sue Compton has announced she is retiring later this spring after a long career with the Tri-Valley nonprofit healthcare agency, including the past 15 years as its leader.
The sole provider of healthcare for low-income and uninsured residents in Pleasanton, Livermore and Dublin, Axis has more than doubled its service capacity for affordable care during Compton’s tenure at the helm, including opening a new medical clinic, its first-ever dental clinic, and just last summer, an innovative mental health urgent care service, Axis Bridge.
“It has been my honor to lead a team of exceptional healthcare professionals who are passionate about providing high quality care for Tri-Valley residents who face barriers to care,” Compton said in a statement to the Weekly on Thursday.
About her decision to retire, Compton told the Weekly, “I’ll be 70 in June and I’ve been working in the healthcare arena every day since I graduated from college. It’s time to learn how to sleep in and smell the roses. I’m looking forward to walking my dogs in the daylight, getting back on the glorious hiking trails, and doing all the traveling I can.”
James Paxson, chair of the Axis Board of Directors, lauded Compton’s impact on the agency and its patients in leading key growth in care services that “established Axis as a key Tri-Valley institution for years to come.”
“It is impossible to overstate Sue Compton’s accomplishments at Axis,” Paxson said. “This enviable legacy belongs to someone who could not be more committed and or more caring in her work. She will be greatly missed.”
The nonprofit’s directors are in the process of recruitment to identify Axis’ next CEO. The goal is to have a permanent successor in place by the time Compton steps down, which is expected to be in early June, she said.
Compton came to Axis in the 1980s, not long after the agency was first founded in 1972 in a house property on Spring Street in Pleasanton as a healthcare option for low-income children in eastern Alameda County. A public health nurse by training, in the rural south and then Milwaukee, Compton had earned a master’s degree in health administration from the University of San Francisco and worked in management at Children’s Hospital of Northern California.
After serving with Axis in various roles, she was hired as CEO in 2007 — a move the board made “without hesitation”, Paxson recalled.
“Her long tenure at Axis and deep knowledge of the organization were exceptional,” he said. “With that came a deep passion for Axis’ mission, deep caring for the people Axis serves, as well as commitment to Axis’ staff and the delivery of quality healthcare.”
When Compton took the reins, Axis had two locations and provided primary care medicine, mental health counseling and a women’s, infants and children (WIC) nutrition program. Since, the agency has grown to serve 15,000 local residents at five sites — with another in Livermore on the way — while adding dental, acupuncture and chiropractic among other new services.
The organization also increased from 70 employees to nearly 200, with an operating budget of $31 million, compared to $7 million in her first year, according to Axis officials.
“With the support of a devoted Board of Directors and the entire Axis team, I am proud of the many services we offer in our community and of the impact we have on the lives of more than 15,000 Tri-Valley residents,” Compton said.
“Working with an incredible senior team — the secret sauce has been to surround myself with brilliant mission-driven people,” she added. “Together, we have created so much, and I am humbled and honored to work with them.”
Among her proudest accomplishments, Compton listed the opening of Axis’ $12 million medical clinic on West Las Positas Boulevard in Pleasanton in 2016, which gave the agency space to double its service capacity, as well as the opening of its dental clinic in Dublin in 2019, which made affordable dental care available to uninsured residents in the Tri-Valley for the first time.
She also noted Axis is in the development process for a new clinic in downtown Livermore to expand medical, dental and counseling services — on track to open some time in 2023.
Compton pointed to the new Axis Bridge program and COVID-19 pandemic response as well.
“The creation of Axis Bridge: an innovative mental health urgent care service that is available to everyone in the community, insured or uninsured; supported by all three cities and Alameda County, opened in July 2021 and provides rapid access to mental health services, care management and psychiatry services for anyone who is facing an urgent mental health concern,” she said.
Compton added that during the pandemic, “Our staff pivoted to telehealth in 48 hours, set up testing and vaccination services, and coordinated services with local school districts and community sites; to date we have provided more than 20,000 COVID tests and more than 25,000 vaccinations — and counting. The Axis staff has worked tirelessly for the past two years and I couldn’t be more proud of their dedication.”
Also under Compton’s leadership, Axis was named Nonprofit of the Year by Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan and by the Rotarian Foundation of Livermore in recognition of its work in 2021 during the pandemic. The agency has also been recognized as one of the nation’s top community health centers by the U.S. Bureau of Primary Care.
“Although it is going to be very hard to say goodbye, the Axis team is primed to continue on its trajectory of success and I am confident that the organization will thrive in the coming years,” she said.
In addition to her role as Axis CEO, Compton serves as the board chair for the Alameda Health Consortium and on the Board of Directors of the Community Health Center Network.
