Annual Conference

November 15-17, 2026

The Virginia Association of Free and Charitable Clinics (VAFCC) serves as the organized voice of the Commonwealth's healthcare safety net, leading the way to a Virginia where all people have access to comprehensive, quality healthcare. We are excited to offer you the opportunity to partner in our work to support Virginia’s network of free and charitable clinics and those who fall through the gaps. As the premier educational and networking meeting for Virginia’s free and charitable clinics, their safety net partners, and healthcare advocates, this event is an opportunity to learn, share, and connect with peers from across the Commonwealth. 

 

2026 Conference Sponsors:

2026 Conference Exhibitors:

2026 Conference Supporters:

              


    




Interested in becoming a sponsor or exhibitor? Please contact Rebecca Butler at 804.340.3434 or email rbutler@vafreeclinics.org to discuss opportunities.


 

Check out last year's conference details to get a feel for this event:

Our theme this year was “Sustaining Care in Turbulent Times: Bolstering the Healthcare Safety Net” and focused on equipping free and charitable clinics with the tools, insights, and partners needed to build long-term financial and operational sustainability. We spotlighted strategies and practices that fuel clinic growth, empowering them to move beyond survival and toward long-term impact despite rising demand and limited resources. 

Sunday, November 16, 2025

2:30pm - 4:00pm: VAFCC Board Meeting (VAFCC Board Members only)

4:00pm - 7:00pm: Conference Registration

4:30pm - 5:30pm: Area Clinic Tours (space is limited, advanced registration required)
While in Roanoke, attendees will have the opportunity to visit two VAFCC member clinics located a short drive from our conference venue:

• Established in 1974, Bradley Free Clinic provides free medical, dental, behavioral health, and pharmacy services to those that have low incomes, who are uninsured, and those with Medicaid, who live in the Roanoke Valley and surrounding areas.
• The Fralin Free Clinic primarily serves individuals who are currently at risk of being homeless, experiencing homelessness, and those transitioning into permanent housing in the Roanoke Valley with free medical, dental, behavioral health, and medication assistance.  

5:30pm - 6:30pm: Welcome Reception presented by VAHP & Exhibits
Catch up with longtime colleagues and make new acquaintances during an evening welcome reception featuring host bar and light appetizers.

6:30pm-9:00pm: Dine Around & Scavenger Hunt presented by Humana Healthy Horizons
Enjoy a meal out together at an area restaurant or stay on-site and dine in at the Hotel Roanoke. Explore the city with a curated "Highlights of Downtown Roanoke" scavenger hunt and be entered to win a prize!

Monday, November 17, 2025

• 8:30am: Welcome by Roanoke Mayor Joe Cobb and City Manager Valmarie Turner 

• Simplified Fundraising Planning for All Nonprofits with Chad Barger, Productive Fundraising (Fund Development Track)
  • ​Join for a workshop on fundraising planning, where we will cover some of the biggest mistakes that nonprofit organizations make when putting together their annual fundraising plan and how to avoid them. Processes and tools will be shared which pare the planning process down to its simplest form. Attendees will leave with actionable steps that they can take to make their organization’s planning process more effective and efficient.
• From Service to Sustainability: Leveraging Volunteerism for Long-Term Impact with Analise Gammel, Serve Virginia (Volunteer Track)
  • In this session, we will explore how organizations can strategically leverage service and cultivate capacity with their volunteers in five strategic areas to maximize community impact. Insights from the Virginia Community Engagement Index and the accompanying SERVE Framework provide tactics that can be used to grow and leverage service and volunteerism as an asset to address any community need. Through this session, participants will gain a deeper understanding of the trends in volunteerism and how to use this information to build stronger volunteer networks, foster more meaningful partnerships, and create sustainable service initiatives that yield a lasting impact. By the end, attendees will be equipped with practical tools to enhance their current programs, engage diverse groups of volunteers, and develop long-term strategies that drive real change in their communities.
• Stronger Together: Collaborating as a Health Safety Net with Lee Clark, Fralin Free Clinic, Janine Underwood, Bradley Free Clinic, Cynthia Morrow, Virginia Department of Health, Aaron Boush, Carilion Clinic, and Jonathan Stewart, New Horizons Health (Partnership Track)
  • This panel brings together leaders from across Roanoke's healthcare safety net—including free clinics, Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC), hospital, and the local department of health—to share successes in working together to improve access, quality, and continuity of care. Panelists will discuss how partnering helped to reduce duplication, close care gaps, address social determinants of health, and create more sustainable systems of support. Attendees will gain insights into successful models of collaboration, lessons learned on overcoming barriers, and practical steps they can take to strengthen their own local networks.

• 12:15pm: Cutting Through the Noise - What's working NOW to Spur Donor Engagement 

This session will deliver proven ways to capture donor attention.  We’ll look at the challenge of cutting through the noise in today’s daily communication onslaught and the importance of donor retention. You'll learn simple, actionable steps that your clinic can take to boost donor engagement. Examples will be shared of creative ways that real life nonprofit organizations identified, cultivated, solicited and stewarded their donors (including some that had no budget for doing so).

Chad Barger, ACFRE, ACNP, is the chief strategist and owner of the firm Productive Fundraising, which focuses on bringing actionable, research-based fundraising tactics to small and mid-sized non-profits. He is a top-rated conference speaker and webinar presenter as well as a master trainer and coach. He teaches fundraising at both Temple University and Messiah University and is one of only 117 fundraisers in the world to achieve the Advanced Certified Fund Raising Executive (ACFRE) credential. He earned his Certified Fund Raising Executive (CFRE) and an Advanced Certified Nonprofit Professional (ACNP).

1:30pm - 2:30pm: Breakout Two

• Igniting Board Engagement for Fundraising Success with Chad Barger, Productive Fundraising (Fund Development Track)
  • Tired of your board avoiding fundraising? It’s time to change that. Join for a board-focused workshop designed to transform your board from hesitant bystanders into confident fundraisers. You’ll learn how to equip, inspire, and hold your board accountable for fundraising. We'll walk you through proven board training exercises to clarify roles, boost engagement, and match board members with fundraising tasks they’ll actually do. Leave with tools, templates, and confidence to build a fundraising culture that starts at the top.
• Telling the Story of your Volunteers’ Impact with Analise Gammel, Serve Virginia (Volunteer Track)
  • Are you new to communications or development, and wondering how to tell the story of the contributions made by volunteers? Are you a program coordinator or manager interested in honing your skills to better measure and communicate about your program’s impact? This session will give you hands on tools and ideas for better sharing the story of your community impact, and specifically how to share the stories about how your volunteers make a real difference in the lives of others. We will also discuss ways to make data collection and evaluation less scary, to help you have the right information on hand to tell compelling stories.
• Charting a Course Towards Better Care and Sustainability with Ashley Edwards, Americares, Dourina Petersen, Chesapeake Care Clinic, Maria Obeid, Culmore Clinic, and Tammy LaGraffe, Free Clinic of Culpeper (Partnership Track)
  • Americares’ Roadmap to Health Equity enables clinics to measure the quality of care they provide while identifying and addressing inequity. This session will include an update on Roadmap's growth and feature the experience of three VAFCC member clinics and the impact Roadmap and the Driving Quality Improvement program has made on their operations, care delivery, and opportunities for funding. Participants will learn how to join Roadmap and leave with tangible examples from their peers of how participation can help their clinic.

2:30pm - 3:00pm: Break presented by VHHA

3:00pm - 4:00pm: General Session presented by Americares

Campaigns that Last: Building Fundraising Capacity with Care 
Capital and major gift campaigns can be transformational moments for a clinic—helping meet growing needs, deepen community impact, and elevate your fundraising maturity. But the real opportunity is in using that momentum to build a strong, sustainable development program that reflects your mission long after the campaign ends. In this session, consultants and clinic leaders will share real-world stories of campaigns that not only raised significant funds, but also strengthened internal capacity, deepened donor relationships and fostered a lasting culture of philanthropy among staff and board. You’ll learn how to position your organization for campaign success, prepare for the journey, and keep fundraising energy high once the campaign is over.

:30pm-9:00pm: Dine Around & Scavenger Hunt presented by Humana Healthy Horizons
Enjoy a meal out together at an area restaurant or stay on-site and dine in at the Hotel Roanoke. Explore the city with a curated "Highlights of Downtown Roanoke" scavenger hunt and be entered to win a prize!

Tuesday, November 18, 2025

7:00am - 11:00am: Conference Registration

7:30am - 9:00am: Breakfast & Featured Speaker

• 8:15am: Post Election Analysis with Dr. Karen Hult, ​Professor of Political Science and PhD Program Director for the Center for Public Administration & Policy at Virginia Tech. She has served as an election night analyst on the National Public Radio affiliate WVTF and frequently speaks with journalists about the U.S. presidency as well as Virginia politics and government.

8:00am - 11:00pm: Exhibits & Conference Lounge presented by Sentara Health
Enjoy dedicated space for networking and connecting with each other and our 25 industry supporters and vendors joining us this year as exhibitors, scroll down to learn more. 

9:00am - 10:30am: Closing Plenary presented by VA SORH on Leading with Purpose in the Age of AI

This inspiring and practical session reframes the role of AI in mission-driven work, showing how leaders can use it to connect with donors, strengthen teams, and build sustainable systems of operation. Through live demos and small-group challenges, participants will see how to “co-think” with AI to increase effectiveness without losing their humanity. We’ll explore what’s changing in leadership, what isn’t, and why those who collaborate with AI will outperform those who don’t. Attendees will leave with practical tools, fresh insights, and a clear sense of where to start - plus a few laughs along the way - to focus their time on the actions that matter most.  

Lynda McNutt Foster is the CEO of Cortex Leadership Consulting, author of Time Mastery 2.0 and The New Playbook of Teamwork, and creator of the AI Strategic Leader Program. She has partnered with leaders for more than three decades, guiding organizations through disruption and equipping them to achieve measurable growth — from taking companies from $300M to $2B, to preparing executives for multi-million-dollar exits. Lynda has delivered over 6,000 executive coaching sessions and authored hundreds of articles, including Leadership 3.0: Where Conversations, Collaboration, and AI Converge. She also serves as Chief Editor of the AI Leader Brief, bringing executives the latest research and practical insights on leadership in the age of AI. In addition to her corporate work, Lynda has long been committed to community service, as a former board member of The Rescue Mission and a current Community Board Member for Truist. She is known for helping leaders deliver results at work without losing what matters most at home.

10:30am - 11:00am: Break presented by VHHA & Lunch-To-Go

11:00am - 1:00pm: VAFCC Business Meeting (VAFCC Member Clinics Only)
 

2025 Conference Sponsors

2025 Conference Exhibitors

           

                  
 

            

          

       
   
 

2025 Conference Supporters