Recap: June Member Meeting

Action Steps

• Membership Renewal: Thank you to the members who have already renewed; you should have received recent communication from Rachel if we haven’t received your renewal materials. Please feel free to call or email Rachel if you have questions or concerns about your renewals. When you renew you have the option to be invoiced either before or after July 1. Once renewed, members will receive the full FY26 Meeting Calendar. Please save the date for our first Member Meeting of the year on September 22, 2025, in person at JRI in Needham.
• Summit on Thursday: Primary representatives from CLM member organizations, as well as our state agency partners and partners from other child serving sectors have been invited to this gathering to discuss action steps for collective advocacy for children as we are facing heightened threats and challenges both policy and budget fronts. We look forward to reporting back to the community about the immediate next steps and some longer-term action. 

Featured Speaker

CLM's June Member Meeting featured DPH Commissioner Robbie Goldstein who shared that DPH's priorities reflect a focus on preventing involvement in other systems and building community medicine with compassionate care promoting well-being, addressing health/racial inequities, and providing necessary support services. Overarching aspects of their efforts include crisis response, data infrastructure, workforce, and public engagement. DPH's goals include:

• Eliminating Racial/Health Inequities caused by unjust systems, such as by improving maternal and child health services.
• Increasing Access to Mental Health Care by strengthening the health care system to promote the emotional well-being of individuals, especially children and youth with special health needs and their families.
• Promoting Upstream Supports, such as through early intervention, WIC (Women, Infants, and Children federally funded program that provides supplemental foods, healthcare referrals, and nutrition education for low-income pregnant women, new mothers, infants, and children up to age 5), Bureau of Substance Abuse Services programs - e.g., for pregnant/post-partum support, and respite services especially with DMH, DDS and DCF, as well as school-based work and working with communities to handle early childhood care gaps (3- to 5-year-olds).
• Building Public Health Data Infrastructure - along with 35 states creating data warehouses.
• Support Transitional Youth between systems through developing local public health resources, such as shared services arrangements between local communities, e.g., Berkshires, Franklin County, and the Outer Cape.

DPH is the safety net for the safety net. State budget: currently receiving necessary funding from the state and in the FY26 budget DPH wants to maintaining doula services, early intervention, WIC, and behavioral health telehealth, and maternal health bill from last session. Federal budget: The federal climate is concerning, as of the $1.7 billion budget, $700 million if from the federal government. Concerns beyond proposed Medicaid cuts are for the CDC's prevention efforts.

State Agency Updates

• Massachusetts Commission on LGBTQ Youth
  • Annual Report - not much change in recommendations from last year; the plan is to overhaul them next year.
  • Main Efforts: working on special reports, assessing federal impacts, such as to immigrants/refugees/those seeing asylum, trans youth, and transition age youth. Initiatives include:
    • exploring the creation of an LGBTQ youth maltreatment code system within the Department of Children and Families.
    • advocacy on protections for gender affirming care (due to federal threats)
    • providing DESE/education guidance on best-practices for LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC inclusivity
    • Piloting curriculum with DESE for family engagement and acceptance (will bring to DCF)
    • improving data collection
    • While the full impacts of federal restrictions and funding dissolution are still unknown, the Commission urges all stakeholders and policymakers to examine its policies, funding, and programming and develop strategic planning around how to continue this work safely to ensure that LGBTQ youth do not go without needed services.
  • LGBTQ+ Youth Day on the Hill July 30, 2025, 10 am - 3 pm (State House Great Hall of Flags) - Register here.
• DCF
  • looking to expand capacity
  • ending provider contracts for non-secure alternative lockup closing due to underutilization with only 1-5 youth at a time; moving the work in-house.
• OCA
  • monitoring the situation of kids not accessing free meals in the summer because of immigration fears
  • working on program to prevent youth with Autism Spectrum Disorder from drowning (two died last year)
    • The Massachusetts Child Fatality Review (CFR) Program FY24 report, released in January 2025, showed 403 child deaths in 2022, a concerning increase from previous years. A special focus is given to the increased risk of wandering and drowning among children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). 
  • program visits changed to yearly schedule
• DMH
  • New Referral Process (ACCU/IRTP/CIRT)
    • there is only one updated short form and checklist (user-friendly and pdf-fillable); see DMH website: Transfer Protocols and Forms | Mass.gov and now, send all referrals to DMH Central Office at: transferscreenings@mass.gov
    • The attached training provides an understanding of treatment provided in statewide services and info./documents needed to complete a "Request for Transfer"

Public Policy Updates

State Action

• Budget: CLM has continued to advocate for adequate investments in child and family services. The Conference Committee is currently working on the FY26 Final Budget proposal.
• Legislation: Most bills on CLM's Legislative Agenda are sitting with the Committee on Children, Families and Persons with Disabilities and the Judiciary Committee. We will continue to share opportunities for executives to sign on to CLM's written testimony when bills go to hearings and we share hearing information for all.

Federal Action

CLM continues to gather intel and information, and opportunities for action from CWLA and our other federal partners. Please visit the Advocacy section of our website whenever you are looking for this info, and let me know how things are going with your org.: Federal Advocacy - Children's League of Massachusetts 

This week the Senate will debate and likely vote on the budget reconciliation bill (includes proposed cutes to Medicaid and SNAP). The House and Senate are trying to come to agreement and get the bill to the President before July 4.  

After this reconciliation, there will be a longer debate about the FY26 federal budget. In recent years, there have been extensions into the winter and spring. We expect a continued roller coaster, depending on how much of the proposed cuts and increases make it through reconciliation.