Inside EHF: Beyond Health Care is a new series from our team exploring how non-medical factors shape health across Texas. From transportation to food access to public policy, we’ll take a closer look at forces outside the doctor’s office that influence whether people can live long, healthy lives.
In this edition: Shao-Chee Sim, EHF’s Executive VP for Health Policy, Research & Strategic Partnerships, writes that with Texas evaluating Medicaid coverage for diabetes prevention and new rural health investments beginning to flow, a unique window is emerging to move from managing diabetes to preventing it.
As EHF looked to launch its first cohort of the Collaborating for Healthy Communities Initiative (CHCI) in 2022, it became evident that there wasn’t an available resource with information on how many collaboratives exist in Texas, who is doing what work, and where they are operating. This information gap affected both EHF’s ability to support collaborative work and the collaboratives themselves, who often operate without awareness of similar efforts in other regions or sectors.
EHF recognized that the absence of a centralized resource for tracking and connecting these partnerships represented a missed opportunity for learning, coordination, and capacity building across the sector. Through internal discovery and conversations with external partners, EHF initially identified and mapped approximately 40 collaboratives across the 81-county service area. However, it was clear that this was far from an exhaustive search. So, EHF set a goal to dig deeper, committing to a more thorough effort to identify and document collaborative work across the state. What started as a summer internship project grew through extensive outreach and partner engagement, resulting in a comprehensive inventory of collaboratives working to improve health.
In September 2025, EHF launched the Collaborative Registry, containing more than 200 active coalitions across our 81 Texas counties. The timing of the registry’s launch proved ideal, allowing EHF to tie the release of the database to the announcement of EHF’s latest CHCI cohort. Combining the two served dual purposes: it expanded EHF’s reach to new partners and quadrupled the number of applicants to CHCI. The registry fundamentally changed the way EHF was able to conduct outreach to collaboratives for its capacity building work, opening doors to organizations and communities that had previously been outside of EHF’s immediate network.
One of the most valuable outcomes has been building connections with counties and communities where EHF had not previously worked. A notable example is the connection made with Austin/Travis County Active Living Collaborative, a relationship that grew directly out of the expanded visibility the registry provided and continues as the collaborative builds its collective capacity through CHCI. These kinds of connections underscore the registry’s value not just as a directory, but as a relationship-building tool that can create pathways between organizations that might otherwise never cross paths.
The registry serves as more than a simple list of organizations. It represents a strategic investment in the infrastructure of collaborative work itself — a living resource designed to support discovery, connection, and capacity building among organizations doing meaningful work across Texas. The collaborative registry and the larger CHCI work are also surfacing strategic learnings about the continuum of collaborative work from emerging to more advanced efforts that move towards multi-sector impact.
To ensure the registry continues to serve real needs, EHF sends follow-up surveys to understand what collaboratives may want to learn and what resources/content/knowledge EHF can provide to support their efforts. This responsive approach reflects EHF’s broader commitment to meeting collaboratives where they are, rather than imposing predetermined solutions. We’re actively listening, using what it hears to shape how the registry evolves and how EHF shows up as a partner.
At its core, the collaborative registry begins to answer several foundational questions: How is EHF best positioned to work with collaboratives? What are the key capacity building needs/issues for collaboratives? What are the barriers that keep collaboratives from accessing capacity building opportunities? The registry addresses these questions by creating a tool that serves multiple purposes at once and has the potential to deepen relationships across the state.
As the registry continues to grow, and more collaboratives are added, it stands to become an increasingly valuable resource for understanding the full scope of collaborative work in Texas.