2024 Grants awarded to West Virginia Businesses
The new year is here in West Virginia and the 2024 Active SWV Workplace Wellness capacity grant awardees are well on their way to creating wellness initiatives at their locations! Each grantee has created a plan to increase access to physical activity, nutrition, and lactation support throughout the year – Read on to find out more on these businesses and the programming they have planned to increase their staff’s health!
2024 Grant Awardees
- Kanawha County
- 280 employees
Healthnet Aeromedical (HA) is in their second year of grant funding. In 2024 they are focusing their workplace wellness efforts on better access to lactation support for their ground responders. With shifts requiring a lot of time in ambulances and air transport, private and safe pumping space can be impossible to find. To combat this, HA will be adding portable tents and pumps to their ground fleet, while upgrading the lactation space at one of their older ground bases.
- Kanawha County
- 600 employees
The West Virginia DMV in Charleston has a large office footprint that is split into multiple different floors and wings. To add more physical activity opportunities to the space, the WVDMV will be adding 16 weight stations to their office, spread throughout each different space. This gives staff easy access to staying active.
- Kanawha County
- Putnam County
- 214 employees
This is Family Care Health Centers (FCHC) first year participating in capacity grant funding. With multiple locations, they are certifying multiple staff in the CDC backed and evidence based Work@Health program. They have a received funding at 6 of their locations including: - Scott Depot
- Eleanor
- Cross Lanes
- St. Albans East
- Teays Valley
- St. Albans
FCHC will implement a new policy to allow for an activity break every 30 minutes. Another policy change will address sugary, sweet beverages: Family Care will only provide sugar free beverages at meetings and events. They are also going to create a physical activity space with equipment at each of these locations to increase staff access to physical activity.
- Raleigh County
- 100 employees This will be the fourth round of grant funding for Workforce Development Region 1. In previous years, they used funding to create a physical activity space with equipment in their Beckley office. In 2024 they are updating equipment in this space and hosting daily stretching sessions. Work@Health certified grant awardee, Bridgit Arnold, also has multiple “Snacks and Facts” events planned throughout the year. These lunch and learn events give staff the chance to learn about health, while eating healthy together.
- Greenbrier County
- 36 employees
This will be Rupert Elementary’s third capacity building grant! This year, their focus is access to clean water. Their project includes the creation of a new hydration station, stocked with sugar free drink mixes and syrups. Having these drink additions can help transition from daily soda drinking to increased water consumption.
Throughout the grant year, each awardee will receive technical assistance and support from Active SWV and partners throughout the state that can provide additional support. These partners can help with data collection and reporting on your programming, create location specific surveys to find out what your staff need, offer lunch and learn opportunities, support for lactation, mental health, smoking cessation, and nutrition. You can find more of the Active SWV Workplace Wellness partners and resources here!
How can you get involved?
The Active SWV FREE Workplace Wellness membership is your best way to begin or expand the wellness at your location! To receive grant funding, each business or organization must have one employee certified in the CDC backed and evidence-based Work@Health program. This hybrid course will be hosted by Active SWV and will accommodate a cohort in early 2024. To learn more about the free Work@health training click here and to sign up for more information on the upcoming course, register here!
