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Committee on Health advances FY26 budget, restoring key benefits and program funding
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Summary
The Committee on Health moved its FY26 budget report unanimously, restoring funding for Medicaid-covered benefits (including durable medical equipment and dental), boosting HIV prevention, food-access programs and provider reimbursements while urging executive action on remaining gaps.
Chair Christina Henderson opened the Committee on Health meeting Monday and summarized the panel’s FY26 report, saying the committee balanced a tight fiscal plan while protecting core coverage and public-health services.
Henderson told colleagues the mayor’s proposal would shift roughly 25,500 adults from D.C. Medicaid into a Basic Health Program administered by the Health Benefit Exchange, and she warned the BHP would likely omit benefits currently covered by D.C. Medicaid such as dental, vision and some substance-use disorder treatments. Henderson said the committee ‘‘urges the Committee of the Whole to identify this funding, particularly the $5,200,000 needed for dental coverage.’’
The report restores several specific line items Henderson described in detail: $3.7 million in FY26 (and $12.1 million over the financial plan) to address Medicaid and Alliance reductions; $7.9 million to raise dental reimbursement rates for managed-care and fee-for-service providers; $1.3 million to partially replace lost federal HIV prevention and surveillance funding; and $411,000 to expand DC Health and Wellness Center evening and Saturday hours. The committee also approved a $500,000 recurring grant for diaper and essential-supplies distribution and funded Farmers’ Market Support allocations to help expand markets in low-access areas.
On workforce issues, the committee approved funding for licensure-pathway assistance for internationally trained clinicians, supported the Counseling Compact, and created a Certified Nurse Aide training partnership for at least 25 high-school students. Henderson said the committee moved a BSA subtitle that freezes enhanced direct-support professional wages in FY26 (saving approximately $3.9 million) but urged the executive to unfreeze wages in FY27.
Henderson framed hospital-directed payments and a related hospital tax as a revenue tool reinvested into Medicaid and said the Department of Healthcare Finance submitted a 2025 CMS preprint this month and adjusted its FY26 tax rate; the committee largely reinvested that additional retention into Medicaid.
Councilmembers Brianne Nadeau, Zachary Parker, Charles Allen and Councilmember Felder praised the report’s restorations and local investments. Parker asked for clarification about shifting school health services into DC Health as employees rather than contractors; Henderson said DC Health will hire those staff directly but acknowledged a FY25 reprogramming omission that left positions out of the FY26 budget book and said OCFO/DC Health must complete a reprogramming.
The chair moved the committee’s report ‘‘with leave for staff to incorporate any technical changes,’’ called for the ayes and announced the motion passed unanimously. Henderson closed by thanking committee and agency staff and adjourning the meeting at 4:16 p.m.
The committee’s report includes follow-up requests and oversight directives the council and agencies must address during budget negotiations at the Committee of the Whole and full Council.
