HRSA Rural Health Network Development Planning Grant Program

Applicants to the Rural Health Network Development Planning Grant Program must meet at least one of the three requirements listed below. Note: A planning grant award will be made to only one member of the network who will be the grantee of record.

All applicants that are eligible because they are in a rural census tract in an urban county must also provide their eligible census tract number. Failure to follow these criteria may result in an application being rejected.

1) The applicant’s organizational headquarters must be a public or private nonprofit entity located in a designated rural county or a rural census track within an urban county.

Applicants that are eligible because they are in a rural census tract of an urban area must also include the census tracts of the service areas, cities, counties, etc where the funds will be used.

In addition to 50 States, applicants can be located in the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the Territories of the Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, the Compact Free Association Jurisdictions of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Republic of Palau and the Federated States of Micronesia.

2) The applicant provides services exclusively to migrant and seasonal farmworkers in rural areas.
3) The applicant is a Federally-Recognized Tribal Government or Tribal Organization that provides health related services on reservations or in federally recognized Tribal service areas. Regardless of where the Tribal Government Headquarters is located the entity is eligible.

Applications from organizations that do not meet one of the three criteria above will not be considered under the funding opportunity announcement.

This program brings together key parts of a rural health care delivery system so they can work together to establish or improve local capacity and coordination of care, particularly those entities that may not have collaborated in the past.

The major focus of the Network Planning Grant is to support rural entities in the development of health care networks. The grant program supports one year of planning to develop and assist health care networks in becoming operational.

For purposes of the Network Planning grant program, a rural health network is defined as an organizational arrangement among at least three separately owned health care providers that come together to develop strategies for improving health services delivery systems in a community. For example a Critical Access Hospital (CAH), a Community Health Center (CHC) and a social services organization could come together around a shared purpose, such as coordination of care, in a collaborative activity that allows them to assess the health care needs within their community, share clinical or administrative resources or ensure that local patients have access to a full continuum of care locally. This program provides support for initiating collaborative partnerships with the goal of creating strong networks that will help strengthen the health care infrastructure in their community. Networks can include a wide range of community partners including social service agencies, faith-based organizations, mental health agencies, charitable organizations, educational institutions, employers, local government agencies or other entities with an interest in a community’s health care system.

Successful applicants can use their one-year Network Planning grant funds for laying the foundation of a community health project by convening collaborating partners to conduct planning activities, which could include but are not limited to the following components:

1) Community health and/or provider needs assessments
a. develop and implement a needs assessment in the community
b. identify the most critical need of network partners to ensure their viability
c. identify potential collaborating network partners in the community/region
d. identify placed-based initiatives that focus on targeting resources in efforts to leverage investments

2) Business, operation or strategic plans, such as
a. develop a business, operational or strategic plan
b. carryout organization development activities such as a formal Memorandum or Agreement of Understanding (MOA/MOU)
c. develop a shared Mission Statement
d. establish a network board
e. develop bylaws
f. delineate the roles and responsibilities of the network partners
g. establish network priority areas, goals, and objectives
h. begin carrying out network activities, include activities to promote the network’s benefit to the community, increased access to quality care services, and sustainability

3) Health Information Technology (HIT) Investments:
a. use the funds to hire a consultant that could perform a HIT readiness assessment for the network

Health information technology (health IT) provides the basis for improving the overall quality, safety and efficiency of the health delivery system. HRSA endorses the widespread and consistent use of health IT, which is the most promising tool for making health care services more accessible, efficient and cost effective for all Americans.