Building Effective, Sustainable Partnerships Between State Associations to Strengthen the Safety Net

A core innovation of Phase 1 of the Delta Center was fostering strong working relationships between state primary care associations (PCAs) and behavioral health state associations (BHSAs) to collectively advance improvements in value-based payment and care. In this brief, we describe the process by which PCAs and BHSAs built and strengthened their partnerships, starting from their collaboration on their Delta Center project proposal and ultimately to their joint policy and practice accomplishments. The joint work of state PCAs and BHSAs has helped to cultivate more responsive and equitable health policy and care systems by reaching thousands of health centers and behavioral health organizations.

This brief highlights accomplishments, the benefits the grantees gained from investing time into their partnership and pursuing collaborative work, and lessons learned across the ten state association teams. Lastly, we offer six high-level recommendations for other PCAs and BHSAs that seek to develop partnerships to advance policy and practice.