Calvin Anderson

When the shot rang out in Memphis, muting the voice of a movement, Calvin Anderson was too young to fully understand what was happening. But he remembers vividly the TV broadcasts, and hearing from those close to him who had attended rallies and listened to Dr. Martin Luther King’s speeches.

Before King’s death, “it was a time of feeling lifted — from not having felt like equal citizens in their city and not having had their voices heard,” Anderson says. “I recall discussions in school by teachers and discussions at home by elders about how good it felt to have an opportunity to have their voices heard and have their messages played out, and how it was so important that Dr. King had come to town, bringing his name, his prestigious organization, to help address the issues around sanitation workers specifically, but more in the broad context around civil rights.”

Anderson remembers stories from his elders about limitations on bus rides. “I’m not sure I fully comprehended it then,” he says, “but later on, I understood what they were talking about and what was being done as far as where they had to sit during bus rides and how far they had to go to get to a route.”

Looking back now, Anderson recalls being “in what literally was a segregated school and going to a movie outing. It wasn’t segregated seats by virtue of requirements, but it was sort of an unspoken thing that you sat in different sections.”

Anderson grew up in South Memphis in a single-parent family with six siblings. His mother worked as an aid at what was then the Oakville Nursing Home, and while he remembers the family struggling, he credits his neighbors for making things easier. “That was where community support came in,” he says. “You felt you were truly part of a village, that you were connected to others [through the interactions] in the neighborhood.”

Anderson has remained connected to his neighbors and hometown; he’s served on the board of the Greater Memphis Chamber since 1995. After graduating from the University of Memphis in 1981 with a degree in business, he worked for Prudential Insurance and Universal Life Insurance Company. He was civically active, working on “voter registration activity, and that gave me an introduction to the political arena and a little bit of work on campaigns.” He campaigned for Jim Sasser, and became part of his Senate staff in Washington, D.C., in 1985.

After nine years on Sasser’s staff, Anderson moved home to join BlueCross BlueShield of Memphis (which later merged with BlueCross BlueShield of Chattanooga), first working in government relations, then gradually working his way up to become the first African-American executive officer of BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee. He served as senior vice president of corporate affairs and chief of staff until his retirement last year.

In that leadership role, Anderson says he experienced “a lot of challenges, because if you’re the first one in any capacity, then there isn’t anyone who can mentor you, show you the ropes, and give you the specific set of directions that would be helpful for anyone going into a career. I was fortunate to have a set of CEOs who were committed to diversity, committed to me, and that made the ascension, and the work, easier.”

Anderson worked closely “on the Affordable Care Act during the 2009 legislative ramp-up, then through all of the implementations that came about in 2010, and up through 2017.” Data from Enroll America, a nonprofit group that aimed to get uninsured people signed up for ACA health plans, showed in 2015 that Shelby County accounted for the highest percentage — 14.5 percent — of uninsured residents in Tennessee. Most of the county residents without health coverage were either Hispanic (20 percent) or African American (18 percent).

Anderson says those statistics are in line with the demographics of the state and county and points to the “gap,” which left a large number of people with no access to affordable or available care when Tennessee did not expand Medicaid. “If you are 100 percent or below the federal poverty level, you qualify for Medicaid [TennCare in Tennessee]. If you are at 133 percent of federal poverty level, you qualify for the Affordable Care Act,” says Anderson. “If you are between 100 and 133, then that’s a gap where nothing is available for you.”

Those who fall into the gap are more likely to seek care in emergency rooms or federally qualified health centers, on a case-by-case basis. This leads to a “loss of coordination” in care, and rising costs, as each provider essentially has to “start over” with a patient on each visit. In turn, patients don’t receive the kind of follow-up that is necessary for the best quality care and best outcomes.

Anderson thinks the best way to address the disparities in healthcare access in Memphis is to focus upon workforce development. A skilled workforce gains access to jobs, he says, which then gives access to healthcare, either by access to group coverage at work or the income to purchase independently. “By addressing the jobs and economic development issues, you also address the poverty and healthcare issues.”

Now working for former Nashville mayor Karl Dean as treasurer of his gubernatorial campaign, Anderson is hopeful for the future of our city. “By no means have we solved all of our community problems, but if you look at where we were and where we are now.

“There is a diversity of leadership [in Memphis] that wasn’t here 50 years ago. You look at the business landscape, as far as the number of African-American corporate officers in 2018; it’s way more than the number you could name in one breath in 1968.”