GRANBY, CO – September 28, 2026 – Kremmling Memorial Hospital District, doing business as Middle Park Health, has been awarded $7,259,899 through Colorado’s Rural Health Transformation Program (RHTP). The award will support a coordinated set of Year One projects designed to strengthen access to care, workforce stability, clinical quality, technology and data infrastructure, and the long-term sustainability of healthcare services for rural and frontier communities served by Middle Park Health.
The funding is part of nearly $170 million in RHTP grants directed by the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy & Financing (HCPF) to rural healthcare providers across Colorado. Funded by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), these investments will help protect access to care and support better health outcomes in Colorado’s rural and frontier communities.
How Middle Park Health Will Use the Award
Middle Park Health will implement projects across four approved program areas: Whole Person Health and Support for Alternative Care Models; Mini-Grants to Hospitals; Strengthen and Expand the Rural Health Workforce; and Establish Incentive Payments. Together, the projects address barriers common in rural healthcare, including workforce recruitment and retention, limited local access to behavioral health and specialty care, aging clinical and technology infrastructure, care-coordination gaps, and the need for stronger population-health and value-based-care capabilities.
Project Highlights
- Integrated behavioral health and community care -launch standardized screening, referral, care-navigation, and follow-up workflows at five rural health clinic sites; expand tele-behavioral health; deliver youth mental health and substance-use first-aid training; and strengthen school and community partnerships.
- Forensic nursing services (SANE) – Expand forensic nursing education and certification pathways, strengthen trauma-informed clinical and referral pathways, and establish long-term sustainability plans.
- Regional diagnostic, specialty, and care-coordination network – Modernize advanced diagnostic capabilities, including MRI and other prioritized equipment; strengthen partnerships and regional collaborators; implement standardized referral, transfer, reverse-transfer, and follow-up pathways; expand tele-radiology and tele-specialty access; and improve closed-loop care navigation.
- Hospital clinical and technology modernization – Standardize infusion technology across hospital campuses through Alaris pumps, medication-library development, and competency-based training, while supporting approved IT reliability, secure access, business continuity, and emergency-readiness improvements.
- Rural workforce recruitment and retention – Modernize recruitment, onboarding, and workforce systems; develop housing and workforce-support strategies; strengthen educational and career-pipeline partnerships; and expand mentorship, leadership development, cross-training, continuing education, employee well-being, recognition, and succession planning.
- Rural connected care and population health – Recruit key clinical and program roles, strengthen medical director oversight across five rural health clinics, expand chronic care management to additional payer populations, implement evidence-based care pathways, improve proactive outreach and care-gap management, and monitor quality and value-based-care performance.
- Secure technology, data, and interoperability – Modernize server, storage, network, firewall, identity-access, cybersecurity, disaster-recovery, nurse-call, and end-user technology; expand IT and clinical-informatics capacity; and establish stronger data-governance and quality-reporting processes.
- Clinical integration and healthcare sustainability – Improve billing processes, patient experience, redesign priority workflows, develop shared dashboards, coordinate scheduling and referrals, strengthen value-based purchasing readiness, and begin implementing a Women’s Health Service Line Expansion Plan.
Local Leadership Perspective
“This award gives Middle Park Health an extraordinary opportunity to invest in the people, systems, partnerships, and technology that make reliable rural healthcare possible. Our focus is not simply on adding individual programs. It is on building a more connected and sustainable system so patients can receive high-quality care closer to home, with stronger coordination across primary care, hospitals, behavioral health, diagnostics, specialty services, and community partners,” said Jason Cleckler, Chief Executive Officer of Middle Park Health.
“The Key Initiatives reflect extensive collaboration across our organization and with community and healthcare partners. Each project is tied to measurable Year One outcomes and a longer-term roadmap so that this investment strengthens access, safety, quality, workforce capacity, and sustainability well beyond the initial grant period,” said Bethanie Reynolds, Director of Quality, Risk, Emergency Management, Case Management, and Accreditation and Middle Park Health’s RHTP Project Lead.
Statewide Rural Health Investment
Colorado is directing $169,587,181 in RHTP grants to rural healthcare providers across the state. Through a highly competitive application process, 91 applicants and approximately 250 projects were selected to receive funding across 52 rural or frontier counties and three rural census tract counties.
A complete list of Colorado Rural Health Transformation Program awardees and additional information about RHTP is available on the Colorado RHTP website.
About Middle Park Health
The Kremmling Memorial Hospital District was established in 1933 in Kremmling, Colorado. The growth in the community has continued over the last 90 years, and Middle Park Health (MPH) has grown with it. Middle Park Health is a rural healthcare system serving Grand, Jackson and parts of Summit communities through hospital, emergency, primary care, specialty, diagnostic, rehabilitation, and other coordinated healthcare services. Middle Park Health is committed to improving access, quality, safety, patient experience, and long-term healthcare sustainability locally through its mission of “Keeping Life Grand”.
About the Rural Health Transformation Program
The Rural Health Transformation Program (RHTP) is a five-year federal initiative administered by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) designed to strengthen healthcare access and improve health outcomes in rural and frontier communities. The program supports investments in workforce development, innovative care models, technology-enabled services, and health system sustainability. The program was authorized under Section 71401 of H.R. 1 (Public Law 119-21) to provide grants totaling $50 billion in federal funding nationwide from Federal Fiscal Year 2026 through Federal Fiscal Year 2030.
From the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
Colorado’s award totals $200,105,604.17 for the first year of the program to support rural health transformation efforts across the state and is 100% funded by CMS. The contents of this release are those of Middle Park Health and the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy & Financing and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement by, CMS/HHS or the U.S. Government.
Media Contact
Tiffany Freitag
Director of Business Development
Middle Park Health
TFreitag@middleparkhealth.org
or
Kelsey Life
Marketing Coordinator
Middle Park Health
klife@middleparkhealth.org
A PDF version of the full press release can be found here.
