After months of uncertainty, Congress has passed funding for Community Health Centers through the end of the fiscal year, September 30, 2025. What does this mean for health centers and what are the prospects for long-term funding?
What’s in the Continuing Resolution passed by Congress?
Last week, the House of Representatives passed a Continuing Resolution to fund the government through the end of the federal fiscal year on September 30, 2025. The Senate followed suit on Friday, March 14. The CR extends both mandatory and discretionary funding for Community Health Centers. Specifically, the CR includes the following:
- The Community Health Center Fund will be extended at the annualized rate of $4.26 billion.
- The National Health Service Corps funding will be extended at the annualized rate of $345 million.
- The Teaching Health Center Graduate Medical Education funding will be extended at the annualized rate of $175 million.
- It would complete the discretionary appropriations through the rest of the fiscal year at level funding equal to FY 2024.
- The bill also extends the current Medicare telehealth flexibilities through September 30.
The daily rate for each item is equal to the funding level that Congress passed in December. The bill does not include congressionally directed spending (community project funding or earmarks) that has supported specific health centers and PCA activities in previous years.
Health centers under strain after years of short-term funding bills
The passage of this CR means that health centers have operated under a series of short-term funding extensions for two years. This uncertainty severely impacts their ability to recruit and retain staff, expand services, and invest in long-term solutions for the communities they serve. Nearly half of health centers operate with unsustainable margins and 42 percent of health centers have only 90 days or less of cash reserves.
Health centers need long-term, sustainable funding to ensure uninterrupted care for 32.5 million patients nationwide.
Support for bipartisan, long-term funding bill in the 118th Congress
Strong bipartisan support exists for increased funding and a longer-term extension for Community Health Centers. During the 118th Congress, NACHC endorsed three bipartisan bills to deliver this stability.
H.R. 5378, Lower Costs More Transparency, passed the House of Representatives with overwhelming bipartisan support (320-71). The bill would have provided the most significant increases in mandatory funding for health centers since 2015, enacted payment parity for telehealth services delivered to CHC Medicare patients, and extended funding for primary care workforce programs.
S.2840, the Bipartisan Primary Care and Health Workforce Act, passed the Health Education Labor and Pensions Committee mostly along partisan lines (14-7). The bill would have increased mandatory funding for health centers to $5.8 billion for three years, tripled NHSC funding to $950 million per year, and provided $1.5 billion over five years for the THCGME program.
A bipartisan compromise in December would have increased mandatory funding for health centers and increased and extended funding for the National Health Service Corp and THCGME for two and five years, respectively. The bill would have also enacted payment parity for telehealth services delivered to CHC Medicare patients. The negotiated bipartisan, bicameral agreement fell apart after the bill received opposition for provisions unrelated to Community Health Centers.
Congress can send a strong message by extending and increasing health center funding at levels discussed last Congress, as outlined in the three bills above, in the next government funding vehicle.
Continuing to educate members of Congress about health centers
On February 11, NACHC was excited to host a briefing on Capitol Hill to educate congressional staffers about the importance of health center funding. Health center leaders from rural, urban, suburban, mountain, frontier, and island communities traveled to Washington, DC, to describe how health centers save the health system money and provide high-quality care to one in 10 Americans. At this critical time, we must inform Congress how important stable and increased health center funding is to 32.5 million patients nationwide!
Representatives and Senators will be in their districts from April 14- April 25. NACHC encourages CHC staff to invite lawmakers to tour CHCs, meet staff, and emphasize the need for long-term funding. Factsheets and supporting materials can be found on NACHC’s fly-in page.
To assist CHC staff, NACHC Federal Affairs and Grassroots Advocacy created a toolkit to make hosting your representative as easy as possible.
To join NACHC’s efforts to educate lawmakers about the important role health centers play in the healthcare system, sign up for the Washington Update.