Massachusetts Community Health and Healthy Aging Funds 

Overview

The Funds are an opportunity to disrupt barriers to health in communities across Massachusetts. They represent both a grantmaking and capacity-building resource to invest in organizations and communities addressing the root causes of health inequities through upstream policy, systems, and environmental change approaches.  

In January 2017, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH) completed a landmark revision of the Determination of Need (DoN) regulation. The revised regulation authorized the creation of the Massachusetts Community Health and Healthy Aging Funds. The Funds focuses on investing in communities that have not historically and routinely benefitted from DoN funding. 

The Funds invest significant resources in Massachusetts communities to improve population health outcomes through innovative and sustainable approaches that bring together a variety of people and partners. 

Three funding opportunities make up the Funds: 

• Policy, Systems, and Environmental Change Approaches 
• Community Health Improvement Planning (CHIP) Processes 
• Healthy Aging 

Eligible applicants include Massachusetts-based non-profit 501(c)3 organizations or groups with a 501(c)3 fiscal sponsor, quasi-governmental organizations, and municipalities. For-profit businesses, hospitals, and colleges/universities are not eligible to apply as lead applicants.  

Please visit our website for more details, including technical assistance resources. 

The vision of the Funds is that, through contributions to equitable systems across sectors and the explicit prioritization of people of color and older adults, Massachusetts communities are transformed so that all residents have an equitable opportunity to have the highest quality of life possible.