Rep. Stanley, MA Legislature Approves Support for Fiscally-Strained Health Care Institutions

(BOSTON—9/18/2025) The Massachusetts Legislature enacted a supplemental budget bill that prioritizes care for the state’s most vulnerable populations by strategically targeting support to fiscally-strained hospitals and community health centers.

The legislation, H.4530, addresses a widening funding gap in the Health Safety Net program, which pays acute care hospitals and community health centers for necessary medical care for low-income, uninsured, and underinsured Massachusetts residents. Reckless federal policies and funding shortfalls have exacerbated the fiscal strain on these vital institutions that serve people most in need.

This legislative response provides critical relief in the face of an unfriendly federal government and economic headwinds, distributing aid based on criteria that directs funding to vulnerable populations most in need of assistance.

“This funding provides much needed financial relief to our hospitals and community health centers to ensure that they can continue serving our most vulnerable populations across the state” said Thomas M. Stanley (D-Waltham). “I am grateful to Speaker Mariano, House Ways and Means Chair Michlewitz, Health Care Financing Chair Lawn, and my fellow legislators in the House and Senate for prioritizing this critical funding and strengthening our commitment to make healthcare accessible to all of our residents.”

Strengthening Massachusetts Hospital Systems

The funding agreement makes $199 million available for eligible high public payer acute care hospitals across the Commonwealth through an approach that maximizes federal financial reimbursements, stabilizes the Health Safety Net Trust Fund, and makes targeted payments to hospitals to maximize the impact of taxpayer dollars.

• Provides $122 million in targeted relief payments to certain acute care hospitals utilizing eligibility criteria designed to maximize the impact of taxpayers’ dollars for those hospitals and communities which need it most. The eligibility criteria include:
  • Each hospital’s patient mix, prioritizing those which serve the greatest share of the state’s low-income population.
  • Each hospital’s affordability, prioritizing those which provide services at the most affordable prices.
  • Each hospital’s financial standing, prioritizing those which have the most severe fiscal strain.
• Transfers $77 million into the Health Safety Net Trust Fund to stabilize the program for hospitals providing services to the greatest share of the Commonwealth’s vulnerable populations.

Supporting Massachusetts Community Health Centers

• Community health centers continue to support the Commonwealth’s greatest share of vulnerable populations while facing federal funding delays, Medicaid cuts, and rising pharmaceutical and other medical costs.
• The agreement provides $35 million in financial relief to community health centers, including $2.5 million for the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers to facilitate regional savings initiatives, including shared service options.

Both chambers of the Legislature voted to enact the supplemental budget on Thursday, September 18, 2025. The Governor signed the bill into law (now Chapter 33 of the Acts of 2025) on Monday, September 22, 2025.

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