Policy Priorities
MPHA’s policy priorities for the 131st legislature session are focused on the intersection of Public Health Infrastructure, Climate Change and Chronic Disease Prevention, with an intentional focus on health equity in our approach to identifying and acting on policy issues. “Health equity” means everyone has a fair and just opportunity to be as healthy as possible, and requires removing obstacles to health such as poverty, discrimination, and their consequences, including powerlessness and lack of access to good jobs with fair pay, quality education and housing, and safe environments.
For the 131st Legislature, we will be prioritizing:
- Public health funding, specifically ensuring funds from the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement are used for tobacco prevention and control and public health.
- Efforts to bolster local public health, including boards of health and local health officer training, as well as staffing at local public health units and funding for public health districts.
- The recognition of Wabanaki sovereignty.
- Ending the sale of all flavored tobacco products.
- Increase state funding for cannabis and alcohol use prevention and education, and advance efforts to reduce youth access.
- Gun safety
We work with more than 60 partners statewide, and through these partnerships, we will be advancing public health policies related to climate change and environmental health (including PFAS remediation), reproductive health care, gun safety, youth mental health, and other determinants of health, such as safe and affordable housing and clean drinking water.
We will continue to prevent any rollbacks on public health policies, including funding, infrastructure, tobacco control, and others.