Last year, Coordinated Care partnered with the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department for the Eastside Family Resource Center’s community garden project, here at the ribbon cutting with Mayor Woodards, local elected officials and community leaders.
As a health insurance coverage provider to individuals and families in Washington state, Coordinated Care naturally focuses on its membership and what sets the company apart is its broader embrace of communities to foster whole person health among people from all walks of life.
Coordinated Care addresses many of the state’s most critical healthcare priorities through its own programs to promote physical and mental health and by partnering with organizations that are doing work in keeping with Coordinated Care’s mission to remove barriers and create systemic change for lasting improvements.
“We recognize that so much of what people need goes beyond a visit to the doctor or a prescription. Of course, those are important but what are the other things that impact overall health and wellness?” said Andrea Davis, Coordinated Care’s Vice President of External Affairs. “That’s our frame of reference when we think about how we make investments with community partners.”
Davis explained that Coordinated Care focuses on community giving and investment in alignment with three categories: social drivers of health – food insecurity, education, transportation, and housing needs; equity – healthcare disparities and inequities among BIPOC, LGBTQ+, incarcerated, foster care and other underrepresented populations; and capacity building, adressing workforce shortages and barriers to care.
Coordinated Care’s latest Community Impact Report gives a concise and impressive look into how it has invested more than $8 million across the state over the past five years, $2 million of which in Pierce County to support a wealth of initiatives and programs. Coordinated Care also provides boots-on-the-ground people power with its employees volunteering in wellness-focused activities at community events and at non-profits. Over the past five years, employees volunteered nearly 2,300 hours with non-profit organizations across the state.
Locally in social drivers of health and food insecurity, Coordinated Care has long partnered with Emergency Food Network (EFN) and Eloise’s Cooking Pot. From 2020-2024, Coordinated Care volunteers packed 24,000 EFN Break Bags that were distributed to this many households when students are on extended breaks from school and wouldn’t be receiving reduced-cost meals during the school day. Coordinated Care provided the seed money for EFN to launch its home delivery program for folks who are homebound or cannot get to a food bank, a prime example of removing barriers.
An example of Coordinated Care’s partnership with Eloise’s Cooking Pot, a “Food as Medicine” pilot provided nearly 250 households in Pierce County with boxes containing a recipe and all the ingredients to prepare diabetes friendly, heart healthy, nutritious meals for the entire family.
Coordinated Care’s own One Million Meals Campaign provided over 18,727,000 meals including food distributed via mobile markets and home delivery.
To further community wellness with additional strategies, Coordinated Care helps tackle the current extreme shortage of healthcare professionals, from doctors and nurses to lab technicians and more, through partnering with Tacoma Community College on a scholarship program to remove barriers for healthcare students. Over the last four years, Coordinated Care has provided $100,000 through scholarships that aren’t limited to tuition and books only but allow for other expenses to be covered like rent, childcare, or gas to get to and from campus.
“We give them some flexibility in the funds we provide to support students more holistically,” Davis said. “It still supports them in pursuing a healthcare career, but it also supports them in ways that other scholarship programs couldn’t.”
Doing more in workforce development, and recognizing the link between wellness and financial stability, Goodwill is a major Coordinated Care partner. Goodwill’s Career Readiness Education and Development (CRED) course teaches essentials to job success, from computer skills and basic budgeting to good customer service, teamwork and collaboration skills.
“We’ve sponsored that the last several years and they’ve done phenomenal work providing this program free to individuals that are either looking for some additional skills or to re-enter the workforce,” Davis said.
More partnerships include the Asia Pacific Cultural Center to support its health outreach and food programs for people of Asian and Pacific Islander descent; Associated Ministries’ Youth Host Home Program which pairs young people experiencing homelessness with caring households wanting to make a difference; and the Tacoma Urban League’s Black Infant Health program. Through Coordinated Care’s Start Smart for Your Baby program, 97 percent of all high-risk pregnant women among Coordinated Care’s membership were contacted to set them up for success with all the pre-natal care they need and after delivery as well.
Foster children and their families are close to the heart of Coordinated Care. In 2020, Coordinated Care launched the Foster Care Centers of Excellence designation to elevate clinics that meet more than 50 criteria in providing expert, trauma informed care. To help remove obstacles for youth with developmental disabilities in foster care, Coordinated Care took leadership in the creation of House Bill 1188 which was passed by the state legislature in 2023. Now, children and youth with developmental disabilities who also receive child welfare services have access to appropriate Medicaid waiver services and supports which had previously been denied.
As Davis explained, “This came because our foster care team was working with our foster care members that were facing a barrier trying to access their foster care services as well as developmental disability services. They were being told by the state if they receive one set of services, they can’t receive the other. We felt that was a barrier to needed care. Why was there a law in place that says if you need both, you have to pick one? We thought that was unfair and unequitable.”
Davis said credit is due to the Washington State Department of Children, Youth and Families (DCYF) and legislative champions including then-Rep. Tana Senn, who now serves as DCYF secretary.
Looking back over the past five years, Davis said she is proud that Coordinated Care uplifts its partner organizations that are experts in what they do in serving the community.
“It’s beyond just the, ‘Hey, we want to make sure you get to the doctor and get that bill paid.’ It’s what do you need to be healthy in body, mind and community, and that drives when we think about how we engage with community and our partners,” she said. “Part of that is knowing where we can uplift partners that are serving our members and what the gaps are and how we can help fill them.”
Learn more at CoordinatedCareHealth.com/WA-first.