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| Duby McDowell |
Connecticut has awarded McDowell Communications Group a three-month $250K contract to handle COVID-19 education and PR surrounding the rollout of the vaccines, according to the Hartford Courant.
The strategic communications firm, which is headed by Duby McDowell, has close ties with Connecticut Democrats. It handled the campaigns of Gov. Ned Lamont and Sen. Chris Murphy.
MCG senior VP Maura Fitzgerald, who worked for Sen. Richard Blumenthal, serves as the “primary contact for COVID-19 related matters” for the public health department of the Nutmeg State, reports the Courant.
Hartford-based MCG will augment the COVID-19 communication efforts conducted by state agencies that have limited press teams, said Max Reiss, Lamont’s chief spokesperson. "The biggest story in Connecticut, America and the world is COVID-19,’' he added.
Connecticut has already spent $4M of the $5M that it had budgeted for COVID-19 communications. That effort centered on advertising and social media messaging stressing the importance of testing for the virus.
McDowell, a former political journalist, co-hosts the "Face the State" Sunday morning talk show on WFSB-TV.
Lo Isidro, senior director at Real Chemistry with more than a decade of strategic communications and PA experience, has joined Narrative Strategies.
Nelson Fernandez, former North American chair of APCO Worldwide and managing director of Burson-Marsteller, has joined Volunteers in Medicine Berkshires as director of communications and PA.
Lilit Bargar, who was most recently an EVP in the healthcare practice at Weber Shandwick, comes on board at GCI Health as EVP, corporate practice lead.
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