Colorado Reentry Planning Grant - The Colorado Department of Health Care Policy (HCPF), seeks funding through the CMS Opportunity, State Planning Grants to Promote Continuity of Care for Medicaid and CHIP Beneficiaries Following Incarceration Opportunity (CMS-2T2-25-001). Through 9817 HCBS ARPA funding, Colorado invested in exploratory analysis of the operations of Colorado’s correctional and detention facilities. With this framework in hand, Colorado will work to quickly remove barriers to incorporate new requirements and ensure continuity of care for members upon reentry. HCPF will invest in activities designed to support correctional facilities to operationalize requirements of section 205 of division G of the Consolidated Appropriations Act (CAA), 2024 (P.L. 118-42), as well as the CAA, 2023. The funding investment will also occur in partnership with the Colorado Department of Corrections (DOC), the Colorado Department of Human Services Division of Youth Services (DYS), the Colorado Behavioral Health Administration (BHA) and jails across the state. Funding for contractors and subrecipients will be available through contracts with HCPF or following Intergovernmental Agreements with fellow state agencies who hold existing relationships with potential contractors and funding recipients. The bulk of the grant funding will be distributed primarily in Grant Years 2-4 following research necessary to ensure the appropriate funding amounts and contracting mechanisms are in place. Specifically, the grant work will be divided into three workstreams. First, HCPF will distribute funding and conduct grant activities to support establishing and improving billing readiness by funding a Third-Party Administrator (TPA) contractor to build comprehensive billing procedures with DOC and DYS, as well as developing pathways for jails to be reimbursed for services. At present, facilities do not have experience billing Medicaid and utilize disparate electronic health record systems with differing capacity for billing new payers. The second workstream will focus on health information exchange by expanding the technological capabilities of facilities to engage in bi-directional health information data sharing. Improvements to this part of the system are necessary for strengthening reentry service delivery and care coordination prior to, upon, and following release. Finally, the third workstream will support comprehensive technical assistance for each jail in Colorado that operates uniquely and requires specialized support to achieve full operationalization of reentry service delivery and will also include funding for statewide stakeholder engagement to ensure the best possible system changes for those most closely impacted by reentry service improvements. Over the four-year grant period, Colorado requests $5,000,000 to carry out this work. During Grant Year 1, the funding will be applied to hiring personnel, developing plans for technical assistance and stakeholder engagement, and initiating billing processes. The team intends to use this funding as effectively and efficiently as possible to fund grant administration, establishment of billing pathways, advancements for data sharing, and on technical assistance and engagement with critical partners. HCPF is committed, in partnership with the criminal and juvenile justice systems, to implement all requirements under section 205 of the CAA.
