DENVER — Colorado will distribute almost $170 million to 91 rural healthcare providers next year to try to put them on a more solid long-term footing and improve patients’ outcomes.

The state will receive $1 billion over five years through the Rural Health Transformation Program created by H.R. 1. The sweeping tax law known as the “big, beautiful bill” also included cuts to Medicaid, which the health policy nonprofit KFF estimated would reduce federal healthcare funding for Colorado anywhere from $9 billion to $15 billion over a decade.

The transformation grants aren’t meant to replace that funding, but to make rural healthcare more sustainable in the long run, said Michelle Mills, CEO of the Colorado Rural Health Center and chair of the committee that decided which applications should receive funding.

Still, it arrives at a “critical time,” given the coming federal funding cuts, she said.

“We need this investment now more than ever,” Mills said.

About 780,000 people live in rural communities in Colorado, according to the state’s annual rural health report. Rural areas account for about 85% of the state’s land, but only about 13% of the population lives there.

The committee that reviewed the grants graded them based on whether applicants showed they could sustain the services after the funding period ends and demonstrated they had a plan that would meet a critical community need, state deputy Medicaid director Cristen Bates said.

Gov. Jared Polis and officials from the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing announced the grant distributions Monday morning at Clinica Campesina, a primary care clinic in unincorporated Gilpin County.

Clinica will receive one of the smaller grants, worth $498,745, and will use that money to upgrade its systems to be able to offer more services via telehealth, CEO Simon Smith said. The money will also go toward an assessment of whether the Gilpin County clinic could sustainably offer additional services, such as dental care or behavioral health counseling, he said.

“We have an incredible workforce, but recruiting workforce to rural communities is really difficult,” making telehealth an important service, Smith said.

The head of another grantee, Centennial Mental Health Center, also stopped by for the announcement. Centennial has 11 locations on the Eastern Plains and intends to open a new clinic focused on prenatal and postpartum mental health for mothers and other family members who may be struggling as their families expand, CEO Dante Gonzales said.

They also will use the money to assess whether Centennial is ready to become a “comprehensive” behavioral health center — a designation that would open new funding opportunities — as well as to offer at-home monitoring to patients who have complex medical conditions, he said.

Other funded projects include deploying mobile units in areas without brick-and-mortar clinics, integrating substance use disorder treatment into primary care and training emergency medical technicians to perform blood transfusions on the way for patients who won’t make it to a hospital, Polis said.

“While this doesn’t do everything … this investment will help transform rural health care,” he said.

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