Dogwood Health Trust (Asheville, NC)

Dogwood Health Trust and the Independent Monitor released the annual compliance monitoring report and their letter to the North Carolina Attorney General’s Office (AGO). The release of the report follows Dogwood’s letter to the AGO sent on July 22, stating its intention to notify HCA Healthcare, Inc. (HCA) of two instances of potential non-compliance with the Asset Purchase Agreement (APA) for Mission Health System, as outlined in the Independent Monitor’s (IM) annual report for calendar year 2025.

The 2025 calendar year monitoring report represents the seventh annual compliance review cycle for HCA and is the third annual report delivered by Affiliated Monitors, Inc. since being named the Independent Monitor in 2024.

The IM’s report identifies two instances of potential non-compliance, found in Sections 7.13(a) and 7.13(h).

  • Section 7.13(a) pertains to the continuation of services as outlined in the APA. In addition to degradation of Emergency and Trauma Services and Oncology Services currently being addressed by the NC Attorney General’s Office in the NC Business Court, the report notes the cessation of Industrial Rehabilitation services at CarePartners and continued diminishment of access to certain other services at Mission Hospital, Mission Children’s Hospital Reuter Outpatient Center and CarePartners.
  • Section 7.13(h) notes that HCA shall remain “enrolled and in good standing” in Medicare and Medicaid. On Oct. 17, 2025, Mission Hospital received a 23-day notice of termination of its Medicare and Medicaid provider agreement. After revising its initial corrective action plan to meet the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) requirements, the hospital’s Enhanced Plan of Correction was approved. Mission continues to work with CMS under that plan and has until July 26, 2026, to complete implementation.

For example, the 2025 compliance report and Dogwood’s notice to the NC Attorney General note that while HCA took the necessary actions to return itself to good standing with CMS, Dogwood “would be remiss not to state” that shortly after, in January 2026, Mission Hospital received another Immediate Jeopardy finding. The finding has subsequently been lifted, but oversight has continued under an Enhanced Plan of Correction. Community members should continue to share their experiences with the Independent Monitor.

To visit the IM website where community members can share their experiences and concerns, click here. To see both the letter and the annual monitoring report, click here.

Contact: Erica Allison at 828.358.4867 or media@formationpr.com.

Foundation for Opioid Response Efforts (New York, NY)

The Foundation for Opioid Response Efforts (FORE) announced three grants totaling nearly $1.55 million to strengthen policies addressing opioid use disorder and overdose, protect access to treatment, and support in-depth reporting that deepens public understanding of the crisis.

The two-year grants will support the National Academy for State Health Policy (NASHP), the Legal Action Center, and Tradeoffs, a nonprofit health policy news organization. Together, the projects reflect FORE’s continued investment in critical policy issues, particularly at the state level, at a time when state leaders are navigating changing federal policies, tighter budgets, and responsibilities for administering opioid settlement funds.

The grants will also support efforts to preserve Medicaid coverage for people with opioid and other substance use disorders and provide policymakers, health care professionals, and the public with clear, independent reporting on promising approaches to prevention, treatment, and recovery.

The grants include:

  • National Academy for State Health Policy—to help state leaders develop and sustain systems of care for opioid and other substance use disorders as they contend with changing federal policies, reduced funding, and tightening state budgets. NASHP will develop a state blueprint for sustaining substance use disorder services and lead a 12-month learning collaborative in which up to five state teams will apply and test its strategies. It will also continue bringing state officials together to share effective approaches, coordinate across agencies, and make strategic use of opioid settlement funds and other available resources. ($799,790 over two years)
  • Legal Action Center—to minimize Medicaid coverage losses among people with opioid and other substance use disorders as states implement new federal work reporting requirements. The organization will develop practical toolkits and state-specific resources, provide training and technical assistance to at least 1,500 individuals and organizations, and issue recommendations to state and federal policymakers. It will also conduct a public education and communications campaign featuring the experiences of people who depend on Medicaid for treatment and recovery services. The grant builds on FORE’s ongoing support for the Legal Action Center’s work to protect Medicaid access for people with substance use disorders. ($525,000 over two years)
  • Tradeoffs—to produce six podcast stories, accompanying written journalism and two live virtual events examining urgent and actionable solutions to the opioid and overdose crisis. Through independent, evidence-based reporting, Tradeoffs will translate complex research and health policy questions into clear and compelling stories for policymakers, health care professionals, and the public. ($220,002 over two years)

Contact: Myrna Manners at 718.986.7255 or mmanners@mannerspr.com.

Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts (Worcester, MA)

The Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts announced that it awarded over $1 million in grants to ten nonprofit organizations serving the region. The Activation Fund grants support a wide range of organizations as they build capacity and strengthen their effectiveness in addressing community-identified health issues.

The Activation Fund received a record number of applications this year, reflecting strong community demand for resources that address critical health needs. In 2026, the Activation Fund is supporting organizations working to improve behavioral health, expand food access, increase housing stability, advance youth opportunities, and address the social factors that shape people’s health. Thirty percent (30%) of the 2026 grant recipients are receiving grant funding from The Health Foundation for the first time.

The grant awards, totaling $1,018,398, are as follows:

  • Ascentria Care Alliance—to create a regional Memory Care Center of Excellence by training staff and up to three partnering community organizations as certified dementia care trainers and integrating evidence-based practices into its ongoing workforce development model. ($85,036)
  • Central Massachusetts Housing Alliance—to furnish and equip its new Resource Center in Worcester, providing people experiencing homelessness with access to showers, laundry, rest space, and supportive services. ($118,411)
  • Community Harvest Project—to build a second protected growing tunnel and upgrade irrigation at its North Grafton farm, enabling the organization to grow more fresh produce year-round for hunger relief partners across Central Massachusetts. ($101,980)
  • Community Health Connections—to renovate counseling and group spaces adjacent to its Children’s Behavioral Health Clinic in downtown Fitchburg for an intensive youth behavioral health day treatment program serving ages 12-21 that aims to reduce strain on local hospital emergency departments. ($124,875)
  • Growing Places—to add a loading dock and ramp and convert unfinished classrooms into office space at its Gardner Regional Food Center, improving local food aggregation, production, distribution, and coordination. ($113,096)
  • Our Bright Future—to install a fire sprinkler system in its newly purchased Southbridge Innovation Hub, allowing the organization to open a centralized youth development and educational center serving up to 1,000 students each year through STEM education, workforce development, social-emotional learning, and community programming. ($125,000)
  • Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts—to renovate the space and improve security at its Worcester health center, creating additional patient consultation rooms and expanding access to reproductive health services in a safe, secure environment. ($114,000)
  • Project Just Because—to upgrade loading docks and purchase new warehouse equipment. These improvements will reduce the physical workload on staff and volunteers while increasing safety, efficiency, and the organization’s ability to distribute food and essential items to families in need. ($40,000)
  • South Middlesex Opportunity Council—to renovate its Chandler Street Women’s Services Center in Worcester, expanding capacity for the women’s emergency shelter by about 40% in response to rising community needs. ($75,000)
  • Wayside Youth & Family Support Network—to purchase furnishings and essential equipment for a new, expanded Charlton Community Services site that triples the organization’s footprint in the community and supports the full implementation of its MassHealth Community Service Agency contract serving 27 South County communities. ($121,000)

Contact: Izzy Nickel at izzy@ballcg.com or 617.243.9950.

Health Foundation for Western & Central New York (Buffalo and Syracuse, NY)

The Health Foundation for Western & Central New York has selected 16 nonprofit organizations to receive a total of $1.6 million in funding for general operations through the Strengthening Every Angle (SEA) Change Fund. The SEA Change Fund was launched at the beginning of 2026 to support organizations who are experiencing challenges resulting from drastic changes in public funding over the past year.

The 16 organizations will receive grants of $100,000 each to support general operations. The Health Foundation is dedicating an additional $400,000 in funds to capacity building services for the selected grantees, including individualized coaching and skill development, to strengthen their long-term organizational health.

Over 100 organizations applied for SEA Change, underscoring how many nonprofits need increased support due to recent changes to federal policy and cuts to public funding. The following organizations will each receive $100,000 plus capacity-building services:

  • ACCORD—to support low-income children and families, older adults, and others facing poverty through Head Start, childcare support, food access, housing assistance, and domestic violence services in Allegheny County, New York.
  • Catholic Charities of Herkimer County—to support older adults, families with young children, and residents experiencing rural poverty. Services include health insurance counseling, transportation, companionship, respite, and wellness support for older adults, along with a food pantry and emergency assistance for children ages 0–5.
  • Catholic Charities of Onondaga County—to provide services across Onondaga County, New York, including refugee resettlement, supportive housing and homeless services, older adult programs, and early childhood programs focused on school readiness and parent support.
  • Child Care Resource Network—to support families across eight western New York counties with services that reach parents, expectant parents, kinship caregivers, and providers through childcare referrals, enrollment support, healthy meals, lactation support, mental health consultation, and workforce training.
  • Community Action of Orleans & Genesee—to support low-income children and families, older adults, and other residents in Orleans and Genesee Counties in New York with Head Start, childcare resources and referrals, transportation, weatherization, meals, and food and emergency assistance.
  • Community Action Program for Madison County—to serve people in Madison, Herkimer, Oneida, and Chenango Counties in New York, with a focus on low-income women, young children and families, kinship caregivers, older adults, and adults with disabilities with programs that include Early Head Start, Healthy Families home visiting, access to WIC (Women, Infants and Children nutrition support), and Pathways Community Hub.
  • Harmonia Collaborative Care—serves primarily rural southern Erie County, New York with some reach into northern Chautauqua and Cattaraugus Counties. They support older adults, caregivers, and other underserved residents through mental health clinics, senior care coordination, caregiver support, home health services, and school-based mental health programs.
  • Huntington Family Centers—for services that include free preschool, a senior day program offering meals, recreation, wellness activities, outings, and transportation. They offer neighborhood-based support that helps older adults access benefits, including housing, health care, legal support, and other services.
  • InterFaith Works of Central New York—to offer services that include refugee resettlement, maternal health, family wellness, case management, job readiness, and healthy aging programs.
  • Jewish Family Services of Western New York—to offer a suite of community services and behavioral health and wellness programs such as counseling, family support programming, care coordination, Holocaust survivor support, and more.
  • Oswego County Opportunities, Inc.—to operate more than 50 programs, including maternal and infant support through its home visiting program.
  • Pinnacle Community Services—to support Niagara County’s low-income children, young parents, survivors of domestic violence, and youth experiencing homelessness. Services include care coordination, domestic violence shelter, parenting support, and emergency and transitional services for homeless and at-risk youth. Because up to 20 percent of homeless youth are pregnant or parenting, these programs are also critical to maternal and infant health.
  • Prevention Network—to provide direct services and education to prevent substance misuse, training, and coalition support in Onondaga County, New York. Their parenting programs serve pregnant people and parents of young children through evidence-based models that strengthen parenting skills and help families navigate challenges safely.
  • Volunteer Lawyers Project of CNY—to deliver free civil legal services supporting children, families, older adults, and caregivers through family law, elder law, housing, eviction defense, immigration, estate planning, and assistance addressing medical debt.
  • YWCA Jamestown—to serve women experiencing homelessness or domestic violence, pregnant and parenting women, young children, and families with low incomes in Chautauqua County, New York with housing support, early childhood education, supervised visitation, and sexual health education for young mothers as well as maternal and child health and family stability.
  • YWCA Western New York—to serve young children, school-age youth, women and families living in poverty, and low-income older adults in Erie County, New York with early childhood education, after-school and summer programs, court-based childcare, supportive housing and case management for seniors, and advocacy tied to equity and maternal health.

Contact: Kerry Jones Waring at 716.380.7319.

The Humana Foundation (Louisville, KY)

The Humana Foundation announced its first slate of 2026 grants, dedicating over $12.2 million to programs and research focused on emotional well-being. The funding will support 13 nonprofit organizations and five university research teams focused on combating loneliness, depression, and social isolation among seniors and veterans nationwide.

The 2026 national grants scale the foundation’s proven interventions to end senior loneliness by fostering social engagement and building community solutions. With major investments in organizations like Older Adults Technology Services from AARP ($3,000,000), Friendship Bench ($1,000,000) and the National Recreation & Park Association ($890,000), the foundation is equipping communities across the country with the tools – from digital health literacy to peer-to-peer mental health support – to improve well-being for seniors in their own neighborhoods. By leveraging a strategic mix of nonprofit grantmaking, academic research partnerships, and thought leadership through published insights, the Humana Foundation deploys diverse investment levers to advance evidence-driven and community-centered solutions. These efforts are reflected in the following 2026 grants.

In four key regions and beyond, the Humana Foundation is funding community-based interventions to combat isolation, including integrating behavioral health services into primary care and fostering purposeful intergenerational connections.

Texas

  • Young Men’s Christian Association of Greater San Antonio (YMCA)—to enhance senior mental health support with accessible counseling, group sessions and educational presentations to reduce stigma and improve well-being. ($1,084,000)
  • Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute for Texas—to integrate behavioral health into a primary care setting for seniors experiencing depression and cognitive concerns. ($525,000)

Florida

  • Seniors in Service of Tampa Bay—to reduce feelings of loneliness and depression among low-income, isolated or chronically ill seniors and veterans in Duval County by using volunteers to provide companionship and connection. ($711,000)

Kentucky

  • Owsley Brown Frazier Historical Arms Museum Foundation—to leverage humanities-based programming using artifacts from the museum’s collection to combat isolation and foster a sense of purpose for residents across 14 assisted living campuses. ($450,000)
  • Home for Good—to support a permanent supportive housing model in Louisville, Kentucky, integrating behavioral health programming to address loneliness, depression, trauma, and substance use disorders. ($250,000)

Multi-State Interventions

  • African American Male Wellness Agency—to expand access to mental health resources for African American seniors and veterans in Louisville, Kentucky, and Houston, Texas, to reduce loneliness and depression through monthly peer-to-peer sessions and annual community wellness events. ($750,000)
  • Help Us Grow—to expand a program where seniors provide reading tutoring to school-aged youth, fostering intergenerational connections and social connectedness for seniors in Florida, Texas, and Kentucky. ($150,000)
  • Film Independent—to support the development of media projects that elevate lived experiences of aging, caregiving, and emotional well-being. ($1,250,000)
  • Milken Institute’s Future of Aging—to support research to better understand the conditions that allow caregivers, particularly those in historically underserved communities, to maintain social connection. ($350,000)
  • Elizabeth Dole Foundation—to support efforts to elevate the lived experiences of military and veteran caregivers. ($100,000)

The Humana Foundation is also investing $1.75 million in five institutions exploring new frontiers in emotional health and nutrition, from leveraging AI technology to advancing health equity through culturally tailored interventions and whole-person care:

  • University of Houston (Marino A. Bruce, PhD, MDiv, MSRC)—to validate loneliness measures for middle-aged and older Black men.
  • University of Michigan (Jeffrey T. Kullgren, MD, MS, MPH)—to measure loneliness, social isolation, and well-being among diverse older Americans through a multi-state poll in Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, and Texas.
  • Emory University (Regina A. Shih, PhD)—to develop an intergenerational caregiver support intervention to address mental health, loneliness, and social isolation for youth and older family caregivers in Florida.
  • Florida State University (Zhe He, PhD, Mia Liza A. Lustria, PhD, and Dawn Carr, PhD)—to develop an AI-enabled digital social concierge to promote community engagement and reduce loneliness among underserved seniors living alone.
  • University of Pennsylvania (Kevin Volpp, MD, PhD and Lauren A. Eberly, MD, MPH)—to evaluate the impact of medically tailored meals on reducing emergency room visits and rehospitalizations for diverse seniors with heart failure.

The Humana Foundation will announce a second slate of grants advancing its health equity mission in fall 2026.

Mother Cabrini Health Foundation (Buffalo, New York)

The Mother Cabrini Health Foundation announced a $3 million, two-year grant to the Buffalo Center for Health Equity to support the Upper Broadway Fillmore Transformation Project, a community-led initiative to improve health outcomes and address long-standing inequities in Buffalo’s Upper Broadway Fillmore neighborhood. The funding will support the project’s core infrastructure and early implementation, including establishing a resident-led Neighborhood Council, launching a community-wide planning process, and advancing coordinated efforts across key areas such as housing, health, education, and economic opportunity.

Grounded in years of research and community engagement, the project advances a new model for neighborhood revitalization that places residents at the center of decisionmaking and focuses on the underlying conditions that shape health, including housing, education, economic opportunity, and access to care. The initiative is led by the Buffalo Center for Health Equity and includes local partners Back to Basics Outreach Ministries, University at Buffalo Center for Urban Studies & Community Health Equity Research Institute, the King Urban Life Center, Urban Equity Management Group, and Broadway Fillmore Neighborhood Housing Services.

The focus on Buffalo’s East Side reflects both the scale of need and the strength of the community. The area faces persistent economic and housing challenges, including high housing cost burdens, alongside longstanding barriers to opportunity. At the same time, it is anchored by deeply engaged residents and community institutions working to shape a stronger future.

The Upper Broadway Fillmore Transformation Project is grounded in years of research, data analysis, and direct engagement with residents. Central to the effort is the creation of a resident-led Neighborhood Council, which will help guide priorities, shape investments, and ensure that the work reflects the lived experience and needs of the community.

Funding from the foundation supports the core infrastructure of the initiative, including staffing, community engagement, and coordination across partners. In its first phase, the project will focus on engaging residents, establishing governance structures, and developing a shared neighborhood plan. Future phases will advance implementation efforts across key areas including housing, health, education, and economic opportunity. By aligning resources and leadership around a single, place-based strategy, the initiative aims to demonstrate a scalable model for addressing health inequities at the neighborhood level.

Contact: cabrinihealth@berlinrosen.com

Share this