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Horizon Foundation Awards Half Million Dollars to County's Access to Care Plan

The Horizon Foundation today announced that it has awarded $500,000 to the Howard County Health Department to support the Healthy Howard Access to Care Plan.  The new award supplements $283,000 in additional funding that the Foundation provided to the Howard County Health Department since January, 2007.

"Our organization likes innovation," said Foundation President & CEO Richard M. Krieg, "and Healthy Howard exemplifies how government can innovate to address core community issues. The grant is predicated on awareness that the Foundation and the Health Department share some fundamental goals; among them improving healthcare access for underserved county residents."

He added that "We believe that government must be the driver of significant, sustainable health care reform. This seed funding will improve the county's capacity to implement a vital public sector program."

The Healthy Howard Plan will offer primary care services, discounted prescription drugs, hospital care, as well as specialty care services for 2,000 patients in its first year of operation. The Plan places emphasis on personal responsibility, with participants obligated to set health and wellness goals in tandem with health coaches working for the program. Chase Brexton Health Center, located in Columbia, will be the major primary medical care provider under the program, with Howard County General Hospital also playing key roles.

Krieg explained that the Foundation has worked over the past seven years to expand access to health care. This included dramatically expanding the county's free clinic capacity, proactively identifying Chase Brexton Health Services and encouraging the organization to consider entering the county and hiring Foundation consultants to draft a successful Federal application for the clinic to relocate here.

"Thus far, we've provided $454,000 in financing to stand up the Chase Brexton Clinic in the county, Krieg said.  "We've also awarded $4,450,000 to Howard County General Hospital over the last eighteen months to enable expansion in the scope of hospital care. This includes new treatment capacity and access to care for underserved residents. We were pleased to see county government incorporate Chase Brexton and the Hospital as partners in the access to care plan.

The Columbia-based Horizon Foundation's mission is to promote and enhance the health and wellness of the Howard County community through program development; community-wide planning; public policy activism; facilitating partnerships; organizational and community capacity building; and a variety of grantmaking programs.