HENDERSONVILLE – North Carolina Health and Human Services Secretary Dev Sangvai visited Hendersonville June 12 to tour two social services nonprofits. He advocated for continued support for the groups, one of which is in danger of losing all its state funding, emphasizing their role in supporting the community after Tropical Storm Helene.
Secretary Sangvai visited the Love and Respect Community for Recovery and Wellness, which sponsors a crisis and substance use counseling program called Hope4NC. He then walked down the street to meet with members of the group Caja Solidaria, which provides food to Medicaid recipients as part of a program called the Healthy Opportunities Pilot.
This is his third visit to Western North Carolina since being sworn in as Secretary in January, he told press at the end of his visit.
“One of the things I’ve always believed is that healthcare is a local phenomenon,” Sangvai, who is a family medicine doctor and a previous President of the North Carolina Medical Society, said during a panel discussion at Love and Respect. “Social services are also a local phenomenon.”
North Carolina Health and Human Services Dev Sangvai visited two Hendersonville nonprofits provide food and mental health services including to those impacted by Tropical Storm Helene, June 12, 2025.
The idea behind the Healthy Opportunities Pilots program is a “no-brainer,” Sangvai said during a tour of Caja Solidaria, a participant organization that provides fresh fruits and vegetable to Medicaid recipients. “We have a proven model,” he said. “You have helped us prove it.”
The Healthy Opportunities Pilots provide healthy food and services including counseling for victims of interpersonal violence and transportation to access medical care. An independent study from the University of North Carolina found that this program reduced the cost to cover Medicaid recipients by $1,000 each, Caja Solidaria staff told the Times-News.
Nonetheless, the HOP program is in imminent danger of being discontinued. Current proposed budgets in the state House and Senate include no funding for it and, without a change, the program will stop operating at the end of June.
Members of Caja Solidaria went to Raleigh earlier this month to lobby state lawmakers to reinstate funding for the program but Caja Solidaria leader Amy Landers told the Times-News that the proposed budget remained the same, as far as she knew.
“What HOP has shown us is if you make those investments in the front end, individuals use the emergency room less, they stay healthy, you actually spend less money on health care,” Sangvai said later at an improvised press conference outside Caja Solidaria.
“We are advocating for our elected leaders to reconsider how we’re going to pay for HOP,” he said. “And I’m going to be honest, they are listening to us. I think individuals are generally trying to find a solution.”
North Carolina Health and Human Services Dev Sangvai visited two Hendersonville nonprofits provide food and mental health services including to those impacted by Tropical Storm Helene, June 12, 2025.
Hope4NC operates crisis outreach and peer support programs in 25 counties where the impact from Tropical Storm Helene was the heaviest. The federal government has invested $12.4 million in the program, according to a press release from NCDHHS and Hope4NC staff.
Hope4NC served more people in November and December 2024 than in the entire year before that, Director of Operations Alivea Turner said, sitting with Sangvai at a panel.
“The message that I’m going to take back (to Raleigh) is we need to continue to do what we’re doing, we continue to focus on all the things we talked about, including the behavioral health infrastructure, and making sure individuals have access to mental health care when they need it.”
The General Assembly has appropriated $25 million for mental health crisis response in areas affected by Helene and to support people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, according to a June 6 news release from the Secretary’s office.
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George Fabe Russell is the Henderson County Reporter for the Hendersonville Times-News. Tips, questions, comments? Email him at GFRussell@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Hendersonville Times-News: NC Health Secretary tours social services nonprofits in Hendersonville