Committee presses for bridge funding, AHEAD positions as primary care gaps loom

A state legislative health policy committee on Wednesday discussed a suite of health‑care budget requests aimed at shoring up primary care and behavioral‑health integration, and agreed to press the Legislature to fund two limited‑service positions that the Green Mountain Care Board says are needed to move forward with the AHEAD (all‑payer) model.

Committee members and provider representatives prioritized short‑term “bridge” funding for primary‑care payment reforms and said the positions tied to the AHEAD implementation are a must‑fund item to avoid losing federal model funds and to prevent program collapse.

The discussion centered on several interlocking requests submitted by the Vermont Medical Society and other provider groups: a bridge package to backfill population‑health per‑member‑per‑month (PMPM) payments and capitated payments (CPR) tied to OneCare; base funding and a possible expansion for the Blueprint for Health pilot that integrates mental‑health and substance‑use services (including a DULCE component for new families); workforce supports such as a proposed family‑medicine residency; and targeted pilot dollars for programs such as SASH for All.

Representatives of the Vermont Medical Society told the committee there is $10.8 million in the governor’s recommended budget for Blueprint, CHT patient‑centered medical homes and SASH, and identified two bridge asks they said were their highest…