Friday, May 9, 2025
5/9/2025
Strengthening Public Health Workforce and Infrastructure in Michigan - The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) articulated a strategic plan in January 2022, proposing strategies that focused on achieving the mission of providing services and programs to improve the health, safety, and prosperity of the residents of the state of Michigan. Our vision is to promote health and opportunity for all Michiganders by reducing intergenerational poverty and promoting health equity. Key goals in this plan include public health investment, racial equity, addressing the social determinants of health, and ensuring that all administrations are improving outcomes, investing in evidence-based solutions, and optimizing technology. This funding opportunity is well-aligned with these goals and will help the MDHHS Public Health Administration (PHA) develop a comprehensive approach to implementing solutions, measuring their impact, and improving public health outcomes over the 5 years of the award. Since MDHHS already centers equity in focusing on the core principles of data-driven planning and implementation, and partners with many CBOs, associations, institutions, and others, this award will afford some attention to sustaining the public health workforce, as well the data systems and infrastructure that have been built to purpose. People and their tools need maintenance and training to continue to excel. Underfunding and aging infrastructure have been critical needs for years before the COVID-19 pandemic shone a spotlight on the way these gaps are increasing health disparities, and funding that expanded the workforce and helped to modernize laboratory and data systems needs to be maintained to move these projects into maintenance and improvement cycles. The PHA is proposing activities across all three strategies of this award to entail: A1. Workforce Building capacity by funding key positions needed within each bureau to help strengthen – and sustain – the local and state public health infrastructure and workforce needed to achieve the mission and vision of MDHHS. Under a core team including a newly proposed Workforce Development Director, the public health administration will build out key positions and teams to respond to public health emergencies like COVID-19 and to meet the evolving and complex needs of the communities and populations we serve. A2. Foundational Capabilities This funding addresses staffing and training for the implementation of quality and PHAB accreditation standards, building competencies in communications and workforce development through staffing plans, and providing support for health equity strategies and community engagement across the Administration. Foundational Capabilities will focus on building infrastructure in the administration for communications and financial analysis. This funding will supplement the department’s SDOH strategy by focusing on planning and strategic relationships with underserved communities, including members of racial and ethnic minority groups, tribal, aging populations, and rural health. Training will be an emphasis of A2 as well to support emergency and non-emergency response activities across the administration. A3. Data Modernization Working with systems being built with ELC data modernization awards, this funding will largely support some needed platforms licensing and training to help make data more accessible to PHA and the public. Coordination across the PHA divisions through the Workforce and Infrastructure strategies leverages existing surveillance infrastructure to put the right people, processes, and policies in place to assist the state to solve problems before they happen, and mitigate the impact of threats to public health when they do occur.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).