Rural Northern Border Region Network Planning Program - The ACCESS VT Shared Services Initiative will strengthen Vermont's rural community-based mental health, substance use, and intellectual and developmental disability (I/DD) system by designing a coordinated shared-services infrastructure across the Vermont Care Partners (VCP) Network. The VCP Network consists of 16 state designated agencies that serve approximately 45,000 Vermonters annually and function as the Vermont's primary safety-net provider of mental health, substance use, and I/DD services. On July 1, 2026, Behavioral Health Network of Vermont started doing business as ACCESS VT, an expanded 501(c)(3) that serves as both a business services organization and coordinated community services entity for the VCP Network. ACCESS VT, partnering with three network agencies located in HRSA-designated rural communities, requests $99,623 through the Rural Northern Border Region Network Planning Program to support this initiative. This project advances Legislative Aim #1: Achieve Efficiencies by developing a shared services model that reduces administrative duplication, strengthens data and reporting capacity, supports workforce recruitment and retention, and improves financial sustainability across the network. The project will serve rural and partially rural communities throughout Vermont. Vermont's rural mental health, substance use, and I/DD providers face persistent workforce shortages, provider scarcity, transportation barriers, housing instability, and increasing administrative requirements. Simultaneously, agencies are adapting to major initiatives, including the AHEAD Model, Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics (CCBHCs), Developmental Services System Reform, and the Rural Health Transformation Project. These changes require enhanced coordination, data reporting, quality measurement, and workforce capacity that are difficult and costly for agencies to develop independently. Shared services offer an opportunity to create efficiencies while preserving community-based care. Grant funds will support a structured planning process that builds on more than 30 statewide leadership and programmatic workgroups already supporting collaboration across the network. Activities will include a system-wide assessment of administrative, workforce, technology, financial, and infrastructure functions; identification of high-impact shared service opportunities; financial and operational feasibility analyses; and stakeholder engagement to support implementation readiness. ACCESS VT will engage an external consultant to provide objective analysis and facilitate planning. Areas of exploration include shared clinical leadership, centralized human resources and recruitment, workforce development, benefits navigation, and consolidated information technology and data systems. Project deliverables will include a comprehensive network assessment, feasibility study, governance recommendations, sustainability strategies, financial and operational models, and a Shared Services Strategic Plan. By the end of the project period, ACCESS VT will have a practical implementation roadmap identifying the highest-value opportunities for shared services. This initiative will position the VCP Network to improve efficiencies, strengthen workforce stability, support participation in statewide health reform efforts, and preserve access to essential mental health, substance use, and I/DD services for rural Vermonters.
