G-2103-16790

Families USA, a leading national, non-partisan voice for health care consumers, is seeking funding to continue its Oral Health Care for All Campaign, which began in 2016, the goal of which is to expand oral health coverage in Medicare and Medicaid policies in the short term and long term.

In the last 5 years, Families USA shares that its Oral Health Care for All Campaign has built awareness around the importance of oral health coverage among policy makers, the media and general public by creating and establishing direct relationships with policymakers, broad coalition-building and coalition participation among oral health advocates (this includes extensive work with OPEN, and the coordination of the Medicare Oral Health Coalition), policy analysis, technical assistance for specific states (Florida, Maryland, Maine, New Hampshire and Michigan) and a robust communications campaign.

This Campaign work would continue in 2021, with specific emphasis on including more diverse partners who are representative of community voice. Examples of this in the workplan include intentionally engaging partners representing communities of color, rural communities and people with disabilities in the Oral Health for All Campaign. As a communication tool, Families USA intends to center community voice by performing more social media polls and digital story banking around issues related to oral health coverage.

This year, Families USA sees a unique window of opportunity to use and build on the assets and relationships they’ve created to ensure that Medicare coverage expansion is included in the national FY22 budget – consistent with President Biden’s fiscal priorities - and creating new resources to support state-based oral health advocates in Medicaid expansion work. Families USA asserts that there will be more political will to include healthcare expansion in a national budget, and that states are economically “recovering” from the COVID-19 pandemic, meaning that healthcare-related funding is less likely to face statewide budget cuts. Families USA intends to leverage its strong historical relationships in national and state-based policy-making to continue advocacy moving forward in 2021.

Families USA requested $730,000, approximately $550,000 of which is allocated toward staff salary. Other line items include meeting-related expenses, communications costs and approximately $26,000 for the organization’s annual conference. The grantmaking team is recommending a reduced funding amount of $650,000, which is a $40,000 increase over the funding amount in 2020.

CareQuest Institute has funded Families USA in the amount of $3,694,846 since 2016. The majority of this funding supported the Oral Health Care for All Campaign, and the remaining funding was allocated to the annual conference.