by Tim Froberg
People who work quietly behind the scenes to protect their communities are unsung heroes.
Natalie Vandeveld fits that description.
Vandeveld is the public health officer/manager for Outagamie County Public Health, one of six divisions within the Outagamie County Health and Human Services Department.
Outagamie County Public Health — which operates in close partnership with the Wisconsin Department of Health Services — is committed to promoting wellness and ensuring good overall health across the county.
The organization has a wide variety of core duties. Basically, it ensures that:
- Food is safe to eat.
- Water is safe to drink and swim in.
- Illnesses and diseases don’t spread. In 2025, it provided immunizations to 140 children and adults. Outagamie County Public Health tracks, studies and addresses more than 100 different communicable conditions.
- Communities get help with emergencies such as floods, power outages, and chemical and hazardous materials.
- People struggling with drug and substance abuse can get help.
- Families have access to nutritious food.
- Children grow up healthy. Maternal and child health is an OCPH program consisting of pregnancy testing, BadgerCare Express enrollment, and home visits for new parents.
- Young children ride safely in motorized vehicles. OCPH offers free, by-appointment safety checks in collaboration with Safe Kids Fox Valley.
Vandeveld leads a division of 35 employees who tend to several different public health issues and potential threats. Outagamie County Public Health’s environmental health sanitarians conduct regular inspections and grant licensing for businesses such as restaurants, stores, food establishments, hotels, motels, bed-and-breakfasts, tattoo and body-piercing shops, swimming pools, and campgrounds.
Outagamie County Public Health usually conducts more than 1,000 food safety and facility inspections each year and issues about 700 licenses.
The organization also maintains and provides access to county health records, including county health data.
Outagamie County Public Health is a broad department that leaves Vandeveld with multiple responsibilities of great significance since public health and safety are involved. But she leans on her years of experience with OCPH and strong people skills to deal with whatever potential crisis comes her way. Vandeveld has worked for the organization for 26 years and can’t see herself doing anything else.
“I love public health,” she said. “I love public health at the local level and I love Outagamie County. Working with the public is wonderful and I’ve always liked the dynamics of public health and being a part of the solution for the community. Things have changed over the past 26 years, but I never really thought of going anywhere else.”
A recent example of Vandeveld’s and the division’s duties came during the spring flooding in western areas of Outagamie County including Shiocton and New London. The organization distributed critical cleanup and safety directives and advised residents on how to properly ventilate their homes using bleach solutions to sanitize surfaces and utensils. It also provided free well-water testing kits to check for harmful bacteria and contamination, helped oversee collection sites and drop-off hubs for donations, and warned and educated residents about mold growth and the dangers involved.
“The flooding was significant,” Vandeveld said. “It was a once-in-a-lifetime process that occurred and the amount of flooding that took place was devastating. We were not alone. We worked hand in hand with our other health and human services departments and the emergency management department to have a full response to the residents of the townships and villages affected by the floods.
“We distributed about 100 free [well-water-testing] kits and they were very successful. The majority of them were safe, but it was important to confirm their drinking water was safe.”
Vandeveld and Outagamie Public Health handled the crisis well because they were prepared for it.
“Ever since 9/11 when public health was really put at the forefront for emergency response, we as a local public health department that works within the state health department have been practicing skill-building exercises to respond to emergencies and natural or man-made disasters,” she said. “We work to build relationships and establish connections before these incidents happen. When you build relationships before these things happen, it makes the process much easier. From a county operations standpoint, we prepared because we had practiced for this. Was it perfect? No, but the quality of training we did really helped.”
HELPING IN THE FIGHT AGAINST SUBSTANCE ABUSE
Preventing substance abuse and assisting those with problems has been a high priority for Vandeveld and Outagamie County Public Health. According to 2025 statistics, it distributed 1,600 boxes of naloxone — a life-saving medication that rapidly reverses an opioid overdose.
Naloxone, also known as Narcan, has been available along with fentanyl test strips at three public health vending machines installed by Outagamie County Public Health to provide the community with free 24/7 access to lifesaving and wellness resources. The vending machines also contain basic first-aid kits, gun locks, COVID-19 tests, smoke alarms, and hygiene products.
The supplies are 100% free and completely anonymous. They can be found at the Grand Chute Police Department, the Outagamie County Government Center, and the Grand Chute Fire Station No. 2. The vending machines and their contents were funded by a grant from the Wisconsin Department of Health Services.
“People that need help can walk up to a machine and get it,” said Vandeveld. “It’s something I had never thought we’d be doing, but they have been an important resource. They are the first ones that have been installed in the tri-county area.”
The vending machines are part of the organization’s commitment to its End Stigma campaign, an initiative aimed at reducing the social stigma surrounding mental health and substance abuse disorders.
“People who are struggling with substances can be moms, daughters — people who need help,” Vandeveld said. “End Stigma is a great initiative. This campaign is very important to us.
“We started it last year and we’re continuing to build on it. One of the things that our community health educator, (Carri Ciske), who helps us with substance abuse prevention, told us is that we need to focus on naloxone saturation.
“That’s an initiative where you are providing naloxone in the community where it’s easily available so that if anyone sees a person overdosing, they have that naloxone with them and can intervene and save a life.
“So we’re training more and more people to be comfortable with handling naloxone and administering it when it’s needed — because it does save lives for people who have overdosed.”
AN UNEXPECTED CAREER CHOICE
Vandeveld grew up in the De Pere area and is a West De Pere High School graduate who received her bachelor’s degree in dietetics from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point and her master’s in environmental public health from UW-Eau Claire.
However, dietetics didn’t interest her as much as she anticipated.
“When I got out of school with my dietetics degree, I found out that I really didn’t resonate with that work which was very unfortunate,” Vandeveld said.
But she found something that did resonate quite well with her: public health. She took a job with Outagamie County Public Health in 2000 and has never looked back. Vandeveld served from 2000 to 2013 as a health sanitarian, or health inspector, before eventually becoming a supervisor for the health sanitarians and then a health officer and manager.
“Natalie is very humble about what she does, but I like to brag about her,” said Amanda Hildeman, a communications specialist for Outagamie County Public Health. “She’s very good at building relationships and building up a team around her to ensure that we have a group of people dedicated to making sure our community is protected.
“I have conversations with a lot of [business] operators who she worked with when she was a health sanitarian. They always remember her and tell me how fair she was and how she helped their business.”
The community has shown its appreciation for Vandeveld in recent years. She has marched in the Appleton Memorial Day Parade and thrown out the first pitch at a Wisconsin Timber Rattlers game.
“It’s really nice to be asked to do things like that,” said Vandeveld. “I’m just happy to be doing a job where I can help people.”
DON’T SLEEP ON THESE SUMMER HAZARDS
Another Wisconsin summer has kicked in and Vandeveld and Outagamie County Public Health are prepared for a variety of outdoor threats that pose potential dangers to the community.
“There are a lot of things that pop up during the summer that you may not even consider to be public health-related,” said Vandeveld. “Animal bites are an example — we see an increase in them during the summer.
“This time of the year is bat season in Wisconsin, and bats are a real concern because they carry rabies. We also do a lot on air quality safety, heat safety, and food safety. People are outside having cookouts and barbecuing, so we want them to know how to avoid getting sick and what to do if they do get sick.
“STIs [sexually transmitted infections] are also on the rise this time of the year and we offer help with that.”
When she’s not dealing with public health matters, Vandeveld enjoys family time with her husband, Eric, and 16-year-old daughter, Adeline.
“I’m a homebody, I love being at home and being with my family,” said Vandeveld. “I love volunteering, too. I love giving back to the community.”
For more information on OCPH and its services, visit outagamie.gov or facebook.com/OCPublicHealth.
This article was originally published in the July 2026 issue of Appleton Monthly Magazine.
