1512-11698

This proposal supports the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) to develop new resources and networking opportunities for targeted legislators and legislative staff designed to increase their awareness of oral health and different policy options adopted by other states. Specifically, NCSL will produce print and digital publications aimed at educating and raising awareness among key state legislators and staff about key oral health issues, create and maintain a legislative summary of state policy options focused on oral health, and design and convene a pre-conference session at its Annual Summit which will include expert faculty and discussion. As an organization, NCSL represents all 7,383 state legislators and nearly 3,000 legislative staff. Leveraging its networks, NCSL will be able to transfer information about the importance of oral health, provide examples of effective policies and programs that improve the oral health of gap populations, and bring together important stakeholders with the authority to create progress in this field. $167,474 will be used to support personnel time needed to support the implementation of this work, meeting expenses associated with convening stakeholders, communications and marketing costs to develop and disperse materials to legislators and staff, and administrative costs that support the execution of the proposed work. This proposal aligns with the Oral Health 2020 goal of inclusion of an adult dental benefit in publicly funded health insurance and the target that by 2020 at least 30 states have an extensive Medicaid adult dental benefit, and no states that currently have a Medicaid adult dental benefit roll back or eliminate that coverage.