Page 8 - The Clare Connection_Fall 2018 Flipbook

2 8 CLARE CONNECTION

Resident Profile

Steve Molinari: First-Generation College Grad, Former

Federal Employee Finds Acceptance, Community at The Clare

TO GET A FULL SENSE of Clare Jennings, a lawyer, who encouraged
resident Steve Molinari’s story, it’s Steve to consider law school
important to understand his roots. more seriously. So he attended
A second-generation Italian, Steve and graduated from Georgetown
was born in Charleroi, Pennsylvania, University, taking classes at night
a small town south of Pittsburgh near while he continued to work during
the Appalachian region. Neither of the day.
his parents finished high school, and With his law degree in hand, Steve
his dad began to work from a young had opportunities to serve major drug
age after his father died. But he found companies, but he chose to stay in
success at Corning, Inc., becoming an D.C. with Jack and eventually returned
expert in the glass business. to the FDA, working as a Consumer
“He didn’t have the book education, Safety Officer in what was then the
but he was very smart,” Steve says. Bureau of Drugs. Here, he focused
on regulatory actions involving drug
When a new Corning plant was built
in Greenville, Ohio, Steve’s father was quality, purity and potency.
transferred there, and the entire family From there, Steve got a job with the
was uprooted as Steve was beginning National Institute on Drug Abuse. His
high school. It was a difficult transition Steve Molinari responsibilities included helping to
for the family, and adjusting to life mail order prescriptions and chain categorize controlled substances that
outside of the tight-knit community drugstores, and he wasn’t interested have the potential of abuse and the
they had built in Charleroi was difficult. in that route. regulation of narcotic drug treatment

At age 16, Steve began to work at Instead, he received a commission in programs. He also was involved with
a pharmacy, his first introduction the United States Public Health Service hearings on medical marijuana use.
to the pharmacy profession. When and wound up moving to Washington, “I like to tell people I went from
considering his future, Steve settled D.C. to work on a program for the U.S. therapeutic drugs to recreational
on studying pharmacy at Ohio Food and Drug Administration. In his drugs,” Steve jokes.
Northern University.
two years there, he consulted with Steve retired early, in 1994. He was
“My father, because of his inability physicians and pharmacists to review ready to spend more time with Jack,
to go to school, insisted that I go to data and prove the efficacy of drugs with whom he has now been for nearly
college,” Steve says. “There was no in conjunction with their safety. It 50 years. Plus, his career was trying,
question about whether or not I was was during this tour of duty that he yet he acknowledges his involvement
going.” became interested in drug law. in pharmaceutical changes over the
Life in D.C. Following this stint with the FDA, years.
Steve was the first member of Steve completed a fellowship with “I think everybody’s work is important
anyone in his family to graduate from the Pharmaceutical Manufacturers to one degree or another,” Steve says.
college, and when he did, pharmacy Association. It was around this time “I was not a star, but my work was
had changed drastically. It shifted to that he met his now-husband Jack necessary.”