When individuals reenter the community after a period of incarceration, they often face significant gaps in accessing health care services, which threatens their health and well-being. Individuals with involvement in the correctional system need access to coordinated community services to improve health, behavioral health, and social outcomes to support successful reentry to the community and to prevent repeated movement in and out of the correctional system. Cross-sector partnerships at the state and local levels are essential to successfully align policies, programs, personnel, and investments to meet these goals.   

States have begun making historic changes to the Medicaid program to support the health and well-being of individuals returning to the community from correctional facilities. Much of this work is spurred by groundbreaking new Medicaid policy changes at the federal level, which create a new opportunity to coordinate existing programs across correctional, public safety, public, and behavioral health and social support systems.  

NASHP, in partnership with The Health and Reentry Project (HARP), is hosting a Learning and Action Network to support state officials from across health and human services, behavioral health, corrections, and public safety to exchange information, best practices, and resources as they advance aligned reentry policies and programs. NASHP and HARP also support the State Reentry Learning Collaborative, a multi-state technical assistance opportunity to support states seeking to implement Medicaid reentry waivers.