Syracuse, N.Y. — Rhonda Vesey was getting repeated phone calls a few months ago from an unfamiliar number that she didn’t answer, figuring it was spam.
But the caller was persistent, so she finally decided to pick up. On the line was a representative of one of the biggest healthcare companies in the nation. They’d read about her advocacy to fix a food desert in a syracuse.com article last fall, and wanted her help fixing another problem: lack of prescription drug access.
The Valley neighborhood is a pharmacy desert — a mile-wide area with nowhere to get proper medical supplies. McKesson Corp., a $308 billion medical giant, was looking for a site to open an independent pharmacy through a new program called Project Oasis. Learning about Vesey helped vault Syracuse’s Valley to the top of their list…