Black Maternal Health Fund Advisory Group Meeting - May 5, 2026
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Black Maternal Health Fund Advisory Group Meeting - May 5, 2026
This was the inaugural meeting of the Black Maternal Health Fund Advisory Group, established by CR99 2025. The group met to address the urgent need to allocate the remaining $250,000 in the Black Maternal Health Fund before the end of the fiscal year (June 30, 2026). Key participants included Dr. Diane Young (Health Department), Ariana Beat (Council Legislative Director), Dr. Lewis (UM Capital Region Medical Center), representatives from Child Resource Connect (Jennifer Iverson, Tamara, Natalie Coward), and committee staff. The group discussed potential uses of the funds and outlined next steps for finalizing recommendations.
Discussion Items
- Funding Urgency and Constraints: Dr. Young explained that the fund is a lapsing appropriation; funds must be spent (not just encumbered) by June 30. She noted that many community-based organizations lack existing county contracts, making it difficult to disburse funds quickly. She proposed using a prime contractor (HCDI) that already has a contract with the county to subcontract with multiple organizations, thereby rapidly expending the money.
- Potential Expenditure Ideas: The group brainstormed a wide range of spending options:
- Doula Services: Dr. Young recommended using up to $10,000 to cover two months of salary and fringe for a doula the Health Department had already identified.
- Postpartum Education Series: Online/web-based sessions contracted through a vendor.
- Tangible Items: Blood pressure cuffs for every delivering patient (Dr. Lewis advocated for universal distribution), postpartum kits, and other equipment.
- Mental Health Support: Contracts with a bilingual therapy provider (McGuire Therapy) for group and individual sessions, including childcare and transportation (e.g., Uber codes) for participants.
- Language Access: Funding for language lines or interpreters.
- Childcare/Respite: Providing childcare during sessions to remove barriers.
- Awareness Campaign: An event or campaign to promote existing maternal health resources in the county.
- Barriers to Rapid Spending: Jennifer Iverson (Child Resource Connect) noted that her organization is already strained financially, awaiting payment from the county, and cannot take on cost-reimbursable work without upfront funding. She suggested that a prime vendor like HCDI could hire staff and manage subcontracts to overcome this.
- Legal and Procurement Considerations: Ariana Beat confirmed that funds must be paid out for goods/services by June 30, not merely encumbered. Dr. Young noted that while the legislation requires funds go to nonprofits, the current budget line item was labeled a "maternal health program" rather than a fund, providing some flexibility for the Health Department to directly use the money (e.g., for the doula) after consulting with Chair Oriata.
- Future Planning: The group discussed avoiding similar timing issues in FY27 by planning earlier. They also noted the existence of a separate maternal health work group (also created by CR99 2025) that can continue making recommendations regardless of fund availability.
Key Outcomes
- The group agreed to compile a comprehensive list of spending recommendations, with Dr. Young taking the lead to document ideas and send them to Ariana Beat for review by Chair Oriata (who was absent).
- A follow-up meeting will be scheduled for the week of May 6–7 (or as soon as possible) to vote on final recommendations. Because the group operates under Robert's Rules and votes must be public with cameras on, an electronic vote was not feasible. A doodle poll will be circulated to find a time.
- The group emphasized the need to prioritize Prince George’s County-based organizations and to ensure equity and community needs are met.
Meeting Transcript
I can provide some background information on the legislation for this advisory group. And then I believe Dr. Young has some proposals. Is that right? Okay. Let's go with that. So CR and might be helpful if I added to the link to the chat as well. So CR9, where is it? CR 90 2023. Created this advisory fund. Let me should I have it so I can share it? So I'm putting this here. So while you're doing it, let me give you some background. I probably am the most versed person on this whole thing. So when the legislation got proposed, the health department did support it to develop a maternal health fund. Internal to the county, there was some confusion around how this money is to be used because it came to the health department in a line item as maternal health program. That is different than a maternal health fund. So I developed our maternal health program, which is an expansion of our healthy beginnings program, which I know Dr. Lewis is familiar with, where we conduct maternal and child health care coordination as well as home visiting. And we also entered into a um a partnership with University of Maryland Capital Region Medical Center to offer postpartum home visiting. We did a collaboration with them since last year that we expanded under the maternal health program. And we discovered it's the same funding. So the county gave us 250,000 under maternal health program. So the good news is we hadn't spent any of the money. We have been doing this as part of what we normally do. My team always manages to get the work done with zero dollars. I don't know how they do it, but but they do. But part of this programming was to bring on a doula to enhance the work that we do. That is one of the things that I recommended last year. So we had the person get ready to start. So that's going to come out of this maternal health fund. Here's our dilemma. So now we have to talk about how do we spend that money and then how do we move forward with how that fund should be spent, with part of it being the doula to enhance the services that we offer in the community. So that's how I sum it up for you, and I hope that was helpful for you. Yeah, thank you for providing that. Um just to go back to the legislation, because I think this will be uh foundational to what the the money was allocated after this fund was created. So the link I put in the chat is for CR90 2023, which created the Black Maternal Health Fund. Um it is uh the council was requesting up to one million dollars to be allocated in this fund, um, focus on black maternal health with grants, awards, grant awards given to nonprofits that provide maternal health services. Um so those were the the initial uh those were the parameters for the fund, um, up to one million dollars and provided to nonprofits that provide black maternal health. Um subsequent to that one, um, I put the next one in the chat. Uh it is CR99 2025, and this created the Black Maternal Health Fund Advisory Group. And this is also the legislation that was uh attached to the calendar invitation that you received. Uh so the advisory group has five members, one representative from the council, one representative from the health department, uh, two representatives from nonprofit organizations uh that work in addressing black maternal health. And one representative and one representative from a licensed hospital or health system operating within Prince or Discounty. So the advisory group was tasked with um evaluating proposals, assessing community needs, and making recommendations and fund allocations, right? So within 30 days of the group convening uh the advisory group is to submit a black maternal health fund allocation report to the health department, uh outlining the recommended use of the of the funds, uh the rationale for each fund uh for each uh proposed expenditure and the alignment with equity call equity goals and community needs. So that is where we are with um this meeting now. Uh the first one of as many as we need in order to encumber the funding by the end of this fiscal year. So is quite a bit of a time crunch. Um, but it is a lapsing fund, meaning that it is it if it is not used, it dies in the fiscal year.
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