Vermont's rural health transformation plan - sub-recipients/sub-awardees: more information on subrecipients and sub-awardees for all projects within each initiative will be provided to CMS at a…

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services awarded the Vermont Agency of Human Services $975.268 million on December 29, 2025, under the Rural Health Transformation Program (CFDA 93.798), with performance through October 30, 2030. This cooperative agreement funds Vermont's statewide transformation of rural health care delivery systems across five core initiatives: regionalization and innovative care strategies; workforce strengthening; access expansion across rural communities; innovative quality and cost reduction strategies; and recovery housing and support services.

Work is performed in Vermont. The award funds a cohesive suite of health care innovations and reforms addressing rural access, quality, and affordability challenges while ensuring long-term system sustainability amid rising costs, population health needs, workforce shortages, and housing constraints. The program allocates funds across telehealth technology deployment, remote patient monitoring systems, artificial intelligence transcription and scribe technology, e-consult platforms, Licensed Nursing Assistant training hubs, recovery residences, recovery housing with education and employment services, home health and hospice nurse residency programs, ventilator and dialysis care expansion in nursing facilities, and regional transformation and innovation grants.

Sub-recipients delivering services include health care providers (Northern Counties Health Care, Rutland Regional Medical Center, Community Health Centers of Rutland, North Country Hospital & Health Center, Brattleboro Memorial Hospital, Thomas Chittenden Health Center, Dartmouth Health Home Care/Visiting Nurse Association & Hospice of Vermont and New Hampshire, Lamoille Home Health, Richford Health Center, Five-Town Health Alliance, and Northeastern Vermont Regional Hospital), workforce training organizations (Community College of Vermont, Brattleboro Development Credit Corporation, Town of Hartford School District), recovery support providers (Vermont Foundation of Recovery, Common Ground Recovery, Kingdom Wellness Collective, Serenity House, Turning Point Recovery Center of Springfield, Turning Point Center of Bennington, Dismas of Vermont, Jenna Tatro Memorial Fund, and Vermont Alliance for Recovery Residences), housing and community support organizations (Lamoille Community House), skilled nursing facilities (ST Johnsbury Center for Living and Rehabilitation, Springfield Center for Living and Rehabilitation, Rutland Crossings), educational and financial assistance entities (Vermont Student Assistance Corporation), and technology implementation partners (CLR Opco). The Vermont Agency of Human Services will also procure an independent evaluator to assess program outcomes against defined metrics.

Vermont's rural health transformation plan - sub-recipients/sub-awardees: more information on subrecipients and sub-awardees for all projects within each initiative will be provided to CMS at a later date following completion of state procurement processes. Sub-recipients and awardees will include health care providers (e.g., hospitals, federally qualified health centers, primary care clinics, etc.), housing developers, workforce training and clinical residency programs, among others. The state will also procure consultants and contractors to implement various projects as well as an independent evaluator to assess the outcomes of the state's RHT program according to defined metrics. Total budget amount: $200 million per budget year. Project goals and description of funding uses: the vermont RHT program seeks to advance a cohesive suite of health care innovations and reforms that address the state's rural health care access, quality, and affordability challenges. The program is designed to ensure long-term health care system sustainability in the face of rising costs and population health needs, workforce and housing shortages, and other challenges. Vermont's RHT program goals are to: (1) strengthen the state's rural health care workforce; (2) increase access to timely care across rural communities; and (3) expand innovative strategies to increase quality and reduce health care costs. Funds will be allocated across five core initiatives: • regionalization and innovative care strategies: absent regionalizing services, reducing business efficiencies, and modernizing the system of care, IT is likely that over the next 5 years vermont will see significant erosion of health and social services. To address this challenge, the state will implement a statewide transformation planning initiative to ensure that vermonters can access the right care, at the right time, at the right place, and at an affordable cost. The state's vision is that certain essential services are available in local communities, while other services are in either regional hubs around the state or, for the most complex care, a single location statewide. Regionalization protects access to care over the long term by ensuring non-duplication of services and redirection of resources to high-value, essential services. • establishing a clinically integrated network of shared services: the state will foster collaboration and partnerships across the continuum of independent providers in the state to produce operational efficiencies that facilitate patient choice and market competition. The state also seeks to promote adoption of patient-facing technologies that facilitate delivery of care closer to home. • strengthening primary care: the state will enhance its outdated, foundational primary care reform initiative, blueprint for health, to improve team-based chronic disease care, deliver workforce training, provide transformation assistance to primary care practices, and create a statewide quality improvement and learning network. • health care workforce development: to address significant provider shortages, the state will make strategic investments in workforce programs that strengthen its rural health care workforce pipeline, while simultaneously addressing housing shortages. The state will also invest in enabling providers to practice at the top of their license. • price transparency and insurance competition: the state aims to address rising health care costs and affordability barriers through investments in new accountability tools and strategies.