Colorado Learns about Washington State’s Medicaid and Supportive Housing Services Initiative

Permanent Supportive Housing (PSH) combines affordable, community-based housing with access to supportive services to help vulnerable individuals and families exiting homelessness find stability, improve health outcomes, and reduce the use of emergency crisis services, including shelters, hospitals, detox centers, jails, and prisons.

With a growing interest in utilizing Medicaid to help provide high-quality supportive services for PSH residents challenged by mental illness, substance use disorders, and chronic disease, a group of state health policymakers from Colorado’s executive branch met with their counterparts from Washington state on June 27, 2016.

The visit focused on Washington’s efforts to create a targeted supportive housing services benefit for Medicaid beneficiaries experiencing or at risk of facing chronic homelessness.

Participants discussed new ways to work across state agencies on key policy and implementation issues, as well as how to effectively engage health care and low-income housing providers, advocates, and other stakeholders.

Officials from California were video conferenced into the discussion to share information about their recently approved Medicaid 1115 waiver and the supportive housing services activities they are developing in their state.

“Creating a sustainable source of service funding is pivotal to the long-term success of our efforts to help keep families and individuals experiencing chronic homelessness in stable housing,” said Jenn Lopez, Colorado Governor Hickenlooper’s Director of Homeless Initiatives.

The meeting also gave the Colorado team an opportunity to learn together, helping them kick off their own efforts. “Our trip to Washington state provided numerous insights into replication that will help focus our energy and will continue to inform our approach in serving the most vulnerable.”

The Reforming States Group supports these state-to-state technical assistance meetings for policymakers in one state to learn from those in another state. Is your state interested in learning about an initiative in another state? Contact Trina Gonzalez at tgonzalez@milbank.org.