Kaiser Permanente has awarded $1,067,000 in grants to 19 community organizations and nonprofits in the first half of 2024 to advance access to healthcare and promote health equity in Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia. These recent grants address not only healthcare access but also social factors that significantly impact a person’s total health, such as safe housing, thriving schools, and economic opportunity. Evidence shows that social factors of health account for upwards of 80% of health outcomes and are significant contributors to health inequities.
Recipients of these grants were chosen because they share Kaiser Permanente’s dedication to improving health and advancing equity in the communities we serve by addressing the root causes of health disparities, such as access to health care, nutritious food, affordable housing, and economic opportunity.
“Kaiser Permanente is unwavering in our commitment to enhancing the health of the communities we serve. We recognize that much of a person’s health is shaped by elements and social factors beyond our medical facilities, such as having safe places to learn, play, live, and eat,” said Cynthia Cifuentes, vice president of Brand, Communications, and Community Engagement at Kaiser Permanente, Mid-Atlantic. “These grants will empower us to tackle the social factors of health in our region, forging a path toward healthier, thriving communities.”
The grants will support the following organizations and initiatives throughout the Mid-Atlantic region:
- Lifestyles of Maryland Foundation ($100,000): This grant aims to offer safe, affordable housing for up to 77 individuals in the Charles County area annually.
- Arlington County Government ($50,000) aims to improve services and housing outcomes for persons experiencing homelessness. The grant will support the Arlington County Continuum of Care’s Strategic Plan to prevent and end homelessness and address racial disparities in its homeless response system.
- Community Clinic, Inc. ($50,000) aims to increase health care access among newly resettled refugees in Montgomery and Prince George’s Counties. The grant will support the development of an in-house interpreter program titled “Language Access for All.”
- Dreaming Out Loud, Inc. ($97,000) supports local communities and families with children at risk for diet related chronic disease to improve nutrition security within historically and economically marginalized communities in Washington, DC. The grant will aid in creating a food is medicine produce prescription program to improve nutrition security for target communities.
“Black and Indigenous communities have long known that food is medicine. Now, in this moment, we are excited to center ‘food is medicine’ from a systemic perspective via our partnership with the FlipRx Program, supported by Kaiser Permanente,” said Christopher Bradshaw, founder and executive director, Dreaming Out Loud, Inc. “Our holistic partnership approach will take patients on a journey through community-based food systems, focused on connection and health, highlighted by visiting our urban farms. With the ability to get fresh local produce directly to participants’ doors, we will eliminate barriers to healing and wellness via culturally relevant foods grown by community members — prescribed by their doctors.
- Grassroots Health, Inc. ($50,000) is a youth-focused organization that revolutionizes school-based health education and physical activity for middle school students in Washington, D.C. The grant will fund the “Innovative Sports-Based Sexual Health Promotion Programs” for Title 1 middle school youth and their families.
- Neighborhood Health ($25,000) serves the low-income uninsured women and children in Virginia, primarily refugees from wars in central America. The grant will strengthen Neighborhood Health’s work in ensuring 80% of refugees who are referred by local resettlement and other community-based agencies are connected to essential primary health care at our clinics within 30 days.
- PathForward, Inc. ($100,000) offers an innovative, industry-leading organization with a full continuum of services to meet the needs of adults experiencing homelessness in Virginia. The grant will advance health equity and improve access to health care for those experiencing homelessness.
- The Trigger Project ($75,000) provides paid summer jobs for more to Prince George’s County students and offers a safe space for youths exposed to gun violence to process the trauma of gun violence. The grant will support three of our core TRIGGER offerings: 1) Summer Youth Employment Program, TRIGGER University, 2) School Year Internship Program (SYIP), and 3) Annual City-Wide Gun Violence Prevention Festival.
- Fairfax County Public Schools ($20,000): The grant will support staff wellness projects at 40+ schools. Individual schools submitted applications for sub-granted funds up to $500 for a variety of initiatives designed to support and promote a culture of health and wellness within the schools. This program was developed as a recommendation derived from the Thriving Schools Integrated Assessment (TSIA)
- Maryland Commission on Public Health ($50,0000): This grant will support the development of an infrastructure to enable the Centers for Disease Control Foundation to provide technical, administrative, and staff support to launch the Maryland Commission on Public Health.
- Baltimore Medical System, Inc. ($50,000): This grant will provide bilingual maternal health navigation services for perinatal patients – from pregnancy through postpartum.
- Legal Aid Bureau, Inc. ($100,000): This grant will provide direct legal services for Kaiser Permanente members experiencing housing insecurity to improve housing stability, prevent homelessness, and advance health equity in the Mid-Atlantic region.
- Coalition for Nonprofit Housing & Economic Development ($50,000): This grant will enable the DC Community Anchor Partnership (DCAP) to double the number of minority-owned businesses it refers for contracting opportunities.
- Greater Washington Partnership ($50,000): This grant will support the growth of the Partnership’s signature supplier diversity business accelerator program called “Next Level.”
- Latino Economic Development Corporation of Washington, D.C. ($50,000): This grant will support diverse procurement by providing businesses cohort-based programming and policy research to support diverse entrepreneurs and business owners in Baltimore.
- Northern Virginia Family Service ($50,000): This grant will advance the diverse procurement in Northern Virginia by providing select entrepreneurs with linguistically and culturally relevant small business capacity-building training and technical assistance.
- Uplift Alliance, Inc. ($50,000): This grant provides direct support to 120 entrepreneurs in Baltimore to access capital, connections to procurement, and/or culturally relevant technical assistance.
- Civil Works, Inc. ($50,000): This grant will advance Kaiser Permanente’s Food is Medicine program by supporting the distribution of produce packages to Baltimore area residents and provision of locally grown produce to community members.
- Moveable Feast, Inc. ($50,000): This grant will support the development of interventions through research to improve the health outcomes of Black mothers with high-risk pregnancies.
“LifeStyles of Maryland, Inc.’s mission is to provide compassionate programs and services that meet the needs of those who are underserved in our community resulting in help, hope, and transformation. This grant from Kaiser Permanente will help us to convert a vacant motel into supportive housing for individuals and families who have experienced the indignity of homelessness, as well as for others at risk of homelessness in Charles County,” said Sandy Washington, CEO of LifeStyles of Maryland, Inc. “We appreciate Kaiser Permanente’s partnership in alleviating the suffering of our neighbors in poverty.”
Investing in communities across the Mid-Atlantic region is a key piece of Kaiser Permanente’s mission of improving health. In 2023, Kaiser Permanente invested more than $1.3 million in 22 communities and nonprofits across Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia
About Kaiser Permanente
Kaiser Permanente is committed to helping shape the future of health care. We are recognized as one of America’s leading health care providers and nonprofit health plans. Founded in 1945, Kaiser Permanente has a mission to provide high-quality, affordable health care services and to improve the health of our members and the communities we serve. We currently serve 12.5 million members in 8 states and the District of Columbia. Care for members and patients is focused on their total health and guided by their personal Permanente Medical Group physicians, specialists, and team of caregivers. Our expert and caring medical teams are empowered and supported by industry-leading technology advances and tools for health promotion, disease prevention, state-of-the-art care delivery, and world-class chronic disease management. Kaiser Permanente is dedicated to care innovations, clinical research, health education, and the support of community health. For more information, go to about.kp.org.
