SPRINGFIELD — President Donald Trump’s recent decision to take away money for asthma prevention support in Western Mass. is causing concern among local officials and public health leaders, who believe the loss of funds will likely lead to “devastating” impacts to the community.
On April 25, the Healey-Driscoll administration condemned Trump’s decision to terminate $1 million in funding from the Environmental Protection Agency to the Department of Health to address asthma in Western Mass.
According to the state, the funding was intended to support in-home environmental remediations, such as mold removal and improved ventilation, in Chicopee, Holyoke and Springfield.
Nearly $900,000 of the promised $1 million over three years is being withheld by the Trump administration, the state says.
“By canceling these grants for Hampden County, the Trump administration is undermining our efforts to improve the health of the people of Western Massachusetts,” said Gov. Maura Healey. “With extreme heat, droughts and wildfires becoming all the more common, it’s essential that we prioritize improving air quality and reducing causes of asthma. This is just their latest attack on the health and wellbeing of communities across our country.”
A little over half of the federal grant money was dedicated to in-home asthma interventions and environmental health remediations spearheaded by Revitalize Community Development Corporation in Springfield.
Colleen Shanley-Loveless, the president and CEO of Revitalize CDC, told Reminder Publishing that her organization was six months into the three-year grant program before Trump decided to withdraw the funding.
“It’s devastating,” Shanley-Loveless said. “We’ve been working on this grant for six months; we’re in the middle of helping clients, and now we have to stop.”
Through the grant program, healthy home assessors would visit patients’ homes to see how they can eliminate environmental triggers that exacerbate asthma and other respiratory conditions. Sometimes, these specialists would offer supplies, like dehumidifiers, or environmental interventions such as mold remediation, pest control or duct and vent cleaning.
The specialists also provided an asthma control test and bestowed education tips on families to help them lead a safer and healthier lifestyle in their homes.
The federal funding helped Revitalize CDC expand its asthma prevention programs to include everybody, even those who do not qualify for the organization’s Healthy Homes Program through MassHealth.
“This funding was to make sure nobody slipped through the cracks,” Shanley-Loveless said. “So, people throughout Western Massachusetts that did not have that insurance would still qualify.”
Shanley-Loveless said the organization has seen people’s ability to control their asthma increase by 30% because of these interventions and remediations, which means children are not missing school, parents are not missing work, and people in general are staying out of emergency rooms.
This domino effect has not only yielded cost savings in the healthcare system, according to Shanley-Loveless, but it has also lessened the burden on medical staff so they can now focus on others who need emergency help.
“It has a really profound, positive impact in our area for everybody, not just the people we’re serving,” Shanley-Loveless said.
However, with the money likely eliminated, there is a worry that much of the positive work done in this realm of asthma prevention could be in jeopardy.
Matthew Sadof, a pediatric physician at Baystate Medical Center who has been working with asthma patients in Springfield for 27 years, called Trump’s decision “sickening” and listed the adverse effects the lost money could have on the community.
“Asthma hospitalizations will go up; the cost of care for children and adults with asthma will go up; morbidity and mortality will go up,” said Sadof.
These predictions by the local pediatrician are alarming at face value, but even more so when considering the fact that Springfield was dubbed the “asthma capital of the country” in 2019, according to the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, and was named the fourth most challenging place to live with asthma as of 2024.
Additionally, a recent report by the by the American Lung Association gave Hampden County a “D” for poor air quality, with 5,576 children and 43,484 adults suffering from with disease.
Sadof said that when children are sick because of their asthma, they cannot go to school. When they cannot go to school, they fail to do well in school; and when they do not do well in school, there is a greater chance of living in poverty down the road.
“The question is not, ‘can we afford to do [these Revitalize CDC programs],’ it’s, ‘can we afford to not do [them],’” Sadof said.
There is another inherent tragedy with losing this money, according to the pediatrician. Trump’s decision essentially upends the “culmination of decades of collaboration” that has led to such interventions and remediations provided at Revitalize CDC.
As someone who formerly chaired the Pioneer Valley Asthma Coalition and participated in work with the National Cooperative Intercity Asthma Study, Sadof has seen firsthand the efforts of people looking to curb asthma threats.
He noted that it is essential to maintain these home remediation and asthma prevention methods because poor indoor air quality is a “real problem” for people with asthma.
“The program that was existing at [Revitalize] CDC, in cooperation with some local insurers in Bay State and a bunch of other folks, was really the culmination of decades of community collaboration,” Sadof said. “[It] was designed to take a community public health approach towards asthma that was the result of an incredible amount of work by a lot of people, not just me.”
With little guarantee that this money will be returned, local officials in Holyoke, Chicopee and Springfield are now miffed about what the situation could mean.
Mayor Domenic Sarno joined Healey in condemning Trump’s move and asked the president to “review and reverse this edict.”
“I stand with Governor Maura Healey and Lieutenant Governor Kim Driscoll in condemning this move by the Trump Administration to take away this much needed funding as we continue to tackle this challenging and multifaceted public health issue of asthma,” Sarno said. “My administration has worked very hard to knock down the Asthma rates here in Springfield, but there is much more work to be done to keep all our residents safe, whether young or old, to properly deal with an asthma affliction, or more importantly, prevent future generations from getting it.”
Chicopee Mayor John Vieau, meanwhile, said the Revitalize CDC program has been an important resource for Chicopee residents to live safely in their homes.
“We are disappointed that this critical resource that was slated to provide environmental remediation to homes in Chicopee, Holyoke, and Springfield residents has been terminated,” he said.
According to the state, the DPH has submitted a formal dispute contesting Trump’s termination decision, but in the meantime, places like Revitalize CDC continue to scramble after this latest funding slash.
“We’re scrambling on so many levels with federal funding freezes,” said Shanley-Loveless, who added that another EPA grant between the organization and the city of Springfield for home retrofitting is currently frozen. “This is really devastating for the people we’re serving.”
