Virginia legislators are still hammering out a budget, and the Commonwealth’s free clinics are hoping that means their request for more funds could be fruitful, especially as federal cuts are expected to eviscerate services.
“You can’t get blood from a turnip, right?” said Ashley Greene with the Western Tidewater Free Clinic in Suffolk.
She’s been in the business of serving some of Virginia’s most needy for 12 years and she said costs, from staff to medication and everything in between, have skyrocketed.
“Anyone running a household to a business knows things just cost more," Greene told Radio IQ. "What we’re all facing with the current landscape and what’s coming our way is the need to do more and less money to do it with.”
That warning comes before changes in President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill kick in. It’s expected to see hundreds of thousands of Virginians lose healthcare, driving more patients to free clinics like the ones Greene runs, or to emergency rooms at a higher cost.
Rufus Phillips is CEO of Virginia’s Association of Free and Charitable Clinics, the group that advocates for free clinics at the legislature. He said their network usually gets about $8 million a year from the state, but they need more, $15 million more, to meet the coming demand. But current estimates put new funding closer to $5 million. Phillips said that’s not enough.
“That added demand is really going to stress the health care system in Virginia and free clinics are on the front line when trying to take care of the uninsured," Phillips told Radio IQ. "Things might be challenging now for the free clinics but there’re going to be a lot more challenging over the next few years.”
Budget negotiations are ongoing with a late April target for a final deal. Whether or not free clinics get the funding they say they need remains to be seen.
