Eileen Salinsky, Program Advisor, Grantmakers In Health

August is civic health month and an opportune time to reflect on organizational and individual commitments to civic engagement. A growing body of research has established a relationship between civic engagement and health outcomes, such as improved access to health care services, lower rates of chronic diseases, longer life expectancy, and improved mental health. Evidence suggests that civic engagement and health are mutually reinforcing. Healthy people are more likely to be civically engaged and higher levels of civic engagement appear to improve population health. Communities with more inclusive voting policies enjoy higher levels of voter participation, greater social cohesion, improved community conditions, and better health status.

A variety of resources monitor and explore this important link between civic engagement and health:

In recognition of the vital connection between civic participation and health, Grantmakers In Health’s (GIH) strategic plan identifies community engagement and empowerment as one of five major issue areas that guide our work.  Achieving health equity requires that all people have meaningful involvement in decisionmaking at local, state, and national levels. Our 2024 public policy priorities elevate protecting and strengthening democracy as one of nine key policy objectives. GIH supports policies that promote engagement and build power by facilitating individual and community agency in the decisions that shape people’s lives and health. Public policies, particularly those related to the structure and functioning of our democracy, strongly influence how and when communities can use their voice to advocate for their interests and values.

GIH advances these goals and objectives through a variety of programming activities that seek to increase health funders’ understanding of and investments in efforts to promote a healthy democracy and build power in communities that have been historically marginalized. For example, we recently partnered with the Census Equity Initiative, Fair Count, and Fair Representation in Redistricting to develop factsheets that explore the relation between health-related objectives and the U.S. Census and fair electoral district maps.  A recent webinar co-sponsored with the Census Equity Initiative discussed plans to allow LGBTQ people to identify themselves on the American Community Survey with hopes that such demographic data will eventually be incorporated into the 2030 census. Sessions at our 2024 annual conference in Portland, OR highlighted health funders’ approaches to build community power, support legal advocacy, and aid census planning and preparation. Thought-provoking salons convened in partnership with Philanthropy for Active Civic Engagement considered both the relationship between democracy and politics and health philanthropy’s role in strengthening the civic infrastructure.  

GIH has signed an organizational commitment to the Thrive through Civic Health: We Will Vote (WWV) initiative. Led by the Civic Health Alliance, VotER, and Healthy Democracy Healthy People, the initiative is a coordinated strategic action designed to improve population health by strengthening civic and voter participation across the health sector. WWV serves as an invitation to partner with public health, health care, philanthropy, nonprofit, and community organizations to strengthen voter participation commitments. The focus of the WWV Initiative is to implement a health sector strategy to build awareness, commitment, and momentum and increase voter participation of health sector workers. 

The WWV initiative deepens our commitment to an inclusive democracy for community health and well-being. An important part of this commitment is ensuring that GIH is a voter-friendly organization. We offer employees up to 4 hours of paid leave to vote, remind staff of this benefit, and encourage staff to vote in all elections in which they are eligible to participate.

We urge our Funding Partners to ask themselves: Is your organization voter-friendly? Consider the following recommended strategies:

  • Systematically integrate voter participation into your organization by following along in the Civic Health Compact.
  • Offer Time Off to Vote for Employees. Ensure your workforce has the time and/or flexibility to vote by establishing and promoting your organization’s time off to vote policy. See Nonprofit Vote’s Sample Staff Policies for Time Off to Vote as a great place to get started.
  • Assess the civic health of the communities you serve by monitoring civic “vital signs” like voter registration and electoral participation rates.
  • If your organization is allowed to support voter registration, order Custom Digital Resources to embed voter registration tools and educational resources into the workflows of your teams and organization.
  • If allowed in your jurisdiction, offer your office, reception area, community center, or another space that is accessible to the community by converting it into a voting center or serving as a ballot drop box location. Connect with your local county clerk to see if your space could serve as a polling place or dropbox.
  • Join the Thrive Through Civic Health Campaign. Sign the We Will Vote organizational commitment.
  • Fund non-partisan civic engagement efforts such as integrated voter engagement and community power building. Health funders are increasingly beginning to recognize that investments in civic engagement are not only helpful, but necessary, to achieve health-related objectives. Philanthropy has an important role to play in building an inclusive democracy.

While the strategies cited above focus on organizational actions, individuals can make their own commitments to civic engagement:

  • Check your voter registration status or register to vote.
  • Pledge to vote. Show your support for civic health and health equity by making a commitment to vote.  
  • Share your story using social media. Personal stories are a powerful way to create change and support health sector voter participation. Use this storytelling toolkit to share why democracy matters to you and the health of your community

Civic health describes the current capacity of a community to address issues that impact the well-being of its members. Health philanthropy is uniquely well positioned to advance better health for all through increased investments in and commitment to civic health.

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