June 10, 2016
You may find unique enrollment partners where you least expect them! Many non-traditional partners have proven to be excellent sources to help identify and connect with uninsured families and children. Because of the unique roles and relationships that potential partners such as child care, financial, and housing organizations have cultivated in communities, they can be the perfect partners for your Medicaid and CHIP enrollment efforts. By creating and fostering relationships with non-traditional partners, you may be able to reach even more potentially eligible families and children, further your organization's reach, and boost program enrollment.
Our recent webinar featured a number of non-traditional partners engaged in Medicaid and CHIP outreach. And explore our webinar archive here for additional outreach ideas! We also invite you to contact us via email or Twitter (and use #Enroll365 in Tweets!) to share your Medicaid and CHIP enrollment successes, including best practices partnering with non-traditional partners.
Campaign in Action
The partnership between health care and child care is an important connection to make for the education, health, and overall well-being of children and families. There is an estimated 12 million children under the age of six in some form of care, including informal care settings. The Office of Head Start's 2013-14 Program Information Report indicated that more than 1 million children received Head Start or Early Head Start services that year. Child Care Aware of America promotes affordable child care for families and advocates for healthier environments for children in child care facilities, which includes making the link to health care access.
Their project Healthy Child Care-Healthy Communities, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, promotes healthy, active living practices in child care through advocacy and state plan implementation. Child Care Aware is working with partners to support nutrition, physical activity, and screen time initiatives by best practice sharing and development of training materials. A Healthy Child Care-Healthy Communities toolkit is also in the works replicating the model for improving children's health.
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Indianapolis Regional Office regularly works with vulnerable populations to promote fair and stable housing and positive health outcomes, which means connecting families with health care coverage. The office partners with local nursing organizations to implement a grocery coupon program and conducts healthy cooking lessons in public housing areas that have a large, eligible audience. In addition, the HUD office participates in on-site outreach events on housing and health care with a Health-Net clinic (federally qualified health center) and YMCA fitness center.
These programs provide families with skills and resources in addition to information and enrollment assistance to eligible families. Connect with your regional HUD office to learn more about their existing programs by visiting the "State Info" page at portal at hud.gov or connecting with your regional HUD office through the "Contact My Local Office" option.
Integrating health care enrollment through community financial centers is the innovative way that Insure Central Texas, a Foundation Communities program, has been connecting kids to coverage. Insure Central Texas, offers enrollment at two community financial centers and combines enrollment with tax preparation (VITA), cash for college, and financial coaching. Through their integrated program, Insure Central Texas has enrolled more than 4,500 individuals for health care benefits in 2016.
The Children's Partnership in California has found that small businesses can play a critical role in connecting families and their children to coverage. The organization offers small businesses easily comparable options and affordable insurance plans and provides information about how their employees and their families can enroll in individual insurance through their state channels by reaching out directly to business owners and associations offering and distributing print materials to their target audience. The Children's Partnership has found success using direct mail pieces and sharing fact sheets in both English and Spanish. By creating user-friendly tools and resources -- and taking the time to follow up with businesses, they were able to get owners on board to provide further information and coverage to their employees and their families.