MDGA25’s legislative victories
The Maryland General Assembly wrapped up its 2025 legislative session on April 7th. With the state facing a $3 billion budget deficit, the Horizon Foundation and our partners worked diligently to protect the important progress Maryland has made in recent years to improve health and to advocate for policies that fight disparities and advance equity. Below is a brief recap of our policy work over the 90-day session this year.
Defending and restoring mental health funding. The initial state budget originally included over $100 million in cuts to school based and crisis mental health services. This included a $90 million cut to mental health wraparound services in schools, a $20 million cut in funding for the 988 Crisis Lifeline and other cuts to the mental health system. The Foundation joined grantees like the Mental Health Association of Maryland and Behavioral Health System Baltimore alongside other members of the 988 Coalition to sound the alarm about these drastic cuts that would have been devastating to Maryland families. Together, we came out in force at budget hearings, organized a press conference that generated significant media attention (see and drove grassroots support through a number of action alerts urging lawmakers to restore mental health funding. If not for this advocacy among our partners and community members, mental health services would have been cut drastically at every level – from screening and early intervention, to treatment, to crisis services – at a time when mental health needs, especially for youth, are rising. As a result of our collective efforts, the vast majority of this funding was restored in the final budget – the 988 Lifeline was fully funded and school based mental health services were level funded for the year ahead. Thank you to all of the advocates and community members who organized and raised their voices in support of mental health services in our state.
Advancing health equity, affordability and access. Though the budget was the biggest topic of conversation this year, lawmakers still passed a number of bills that will improve health equity, affordability and access to care. The following bills are a few that the Foundation supported and are headed to Governor Moore’s desk for signature.
- SB 177/HB 56 – Procurement – State Department of Education – Local Food Purchasing Program. This bill will set up a program to better enable local school systems to purchase locally grown produce, helping to ensure students have access to fresh, local, healthy food at school.
- SB 357/HB 424 – Prescription Drug Affordability Board – Authority and Stakeholder Council Membership (Lowering Prescription Drug Costs for All Marylanders Now Act). This bill expands the authority of the state’s Prescription Drug Affordability Board to cap costs on high-cost drugs for all residents in the state, not just for drugs purchased by state and local governments.
- SB 174/HB 345 – Interstate Social Work Licensure Compact. This bill allows social workers to hold a multistate license in order to practice across state lines, reducing the burden and duplicative licensure requirements for social workers and boosting the state’s behavioral health workforce.
- SB 5/HB 297 – Maryland Health Benefit Exchange – State-Based Young Adult Health Insurance Subsidies Pilot Program – Sunset Repeal. This bill makes permanent the subsidies program for young adults to purchase health insurance on the state’s insurance marketplace. This program has been very successful to date, helping over 64,000 young Marylanders to get health coverage.
- SB 372/HB 869 – Preserve Telehealth Access Act of 2025. This bill ensures that the state’s Medicaid program and private insurers continue to provide reimbursement for telehealth services, including audio-only telephone conversations between patients and providers.
- HB 672 – School Health and Wellness Personnel Assessment and Maryland Council on Advancement of School-Based Health Centers. This bill requires the state’s Department of Health and Department of Education to conduct an annual assessment of school health and wellness personnel each year in order to identify vacancies and develop strategies to recruit and retain these employees.
Unfortunately, two of our priorities this year did not pass – the For Our Kids Act, which would have enacted a 2-cent-per-ounce tax on sugary beverages to fund healthier school meals for all students, and Good Cause Eviction legislation that would have strengthened protections for renters. We will continue to organize and work with our local and state partners in the interim to get these important bills over the finish line in the future.
THANK YOU to all of our partners, grantees, community members and lawmakers for their tireless efforts this legislative session and for continuing Maryland’s progress in ensuring all people can live abundant and healthy lives.
