The organization representing 900 community health centers in New York says that without a big increase in funding from the state, many centers will have to cut services, lay off staff or even close their doors.
The Community Health Care Association of New York State (CHCANYS) is asking state lawmakers to increase funding to help them handle what will be a surge of people who turn to their centers when they lose their insurance this year.
The federal One Big Beautiful Bill sharply reduced funding for subsidies for health insurance, with those changes taking place starting April 1. Advocates say 1.5 million New York residents will either be unable to pay the higher rates for insurance or be unable to access insurance at all. Community health centers must take patients regardless of whether they have insurance or are able to pay.
Rose Duhan, President and Chief Executive Officer of CHCANYS, said that health centers that cannot make up the shortages through fundraisers and grants will have little choice but to cut services.
“If there's less access for patients, if patients have to wait longer, they're going to become more severely ill, have more acute illness, and then they're going to show up in emergency rooms,” said Duhan.
Community health centers are asking state legislators and Gov. Kathy Hochul to include $300 million in added funding to help handle the surge of patients without insurance created by the federal cuts. Duhan said proposals for increases from the Governor and Legislature have ranged from $60 to $100 million, but the group is pressing for a larger increase.
Some community health centers saw the changes coming after the federal bill was signed into law last year and began making changes. Tricia Peter Clark, who runs the ConnextCare group of health centers and school-based clinics in Oswego County, said her team came up with a plan to cut costs last year by laying off some staff, closing a center in Parish and ending denture repair services in its dental clinics.
Clark said the influx of newly-uninsured people from the federal cutbacks is a big concern, but there’s an even larger one on the horizon. The economic development agency CenterstateCEO estimates that there will be 12,000 new jobs in central New York related to the construction and operation of Micron’s semiconductor plant in Onondaga County by 2027. Clark said that's because many of those jobs will be filled by people relocating to central New York, and they will need doctors and dentists and therapists.
“We are about ready to get the biggest population growth we've ever experienced in a very short period of time,” Clark said. “If we don't bolster the infrastructure to take care of what is coming, we're never going to be prepared to take care of what will be in the future down the road.”
