Groups hit up county for opioid funding

FOCUSING ON YOUTH

These are evidenced-based programs and are geared to helping teach students life skills, drug information, and refusal skills to help increase the protective factors for the future.”

Michelle Dunn, ADDS Prevention Specialist

LEE COUNTY – Several agencies have come forward to request funding from the county’s opioid settlement funds.
A recommendation committee met Tuesday evening at the Lee County Board offices and heard from ADDS of Southeast Iowa about a program they’d like to start with youth in Lee County.
Michelle Dunn, a prevention specialist with ADDS, said the new program would focus on 4th-6th graders at Lee County elementary schools. She said the program establishes early contact with children who may have susceptibilities to narcotics in the home. The program is called Too Good for Drugs.
“These are evidenced-based programs and are geared to helping teach students life skills, drug information, and refusal skills to help increase the protective factors for the future,” Dunn told the panel.
Guidelines called Core Abatement Strategies govern how counties across the nation can spend the funds pouring in from settlements reached with opioid distributors, manufacturers, and retailers.
The county currently gets funding from a formula that was part of litigation initiated more than six years ago. Iowa gets a portion of national settlements administered by the National Opioid Settlement Trust. The state keeps half of the settlement funds and distributes the other half to counties that signed onto the lawsuits, less a backstop fund that goes to attorneys litigating on behalf of the state.
Lee County currently has $603,000 in its opioid fund with the only expenditures being $55,000 to the Talbot House in Keokuk. The county gets 1.45% of the half that goes to the counties. That is based on several factors including prescriptions written in the county for opiates, median incomes, and crime rates among other factors. That amount is 13th highest in the state. Polk County gets the largest share at 22.81%. Scott County is next at 8.86% and then Linn County at 7.33%.
The county gets a $51,467 current payment in July each year through July 2038 as part of allocations from pharmacy distributors. That payment goes to $60,532 for three years from 2028-2030, and then settles in at $50,884 per year through 2038. In addition, the county has signed agreements with Walgreens, Wal-Mart, and CVS totaling $206,441 over three years.
Dunn’s grant proposal asks for programming costs including salary for the specialist engaged with students, materials, and mileage totaling $70,333 annually. The request is for one year.
The county can allocate up to 25% of settlement funds to indirect costs associated with opioid and co-occurring substance abuse disorders, while the majority of funds have to go to efforts that directly address opioid abatement including;
•  purchase of naloxone or other FDA approved drugs to reverse opioids;
• medication-assisted therapy; expanding treatment for pregnant and postpartum women with co-occurring opioid and other drug disorders;
• neonatal abstinence syndrome;
• expanding warm hand-off, or transition recovery services;
• treatment for incarcerated populations;
• prevention programs;
• syringe programs;
• data collection programs
Dunn said her program would satisfy the core strategy  in prevention programs specific to funding for evidence-based prevention program in schools, and under multiple indirect strategies that addressing support for youth.
Michele Ross, administrator for Lee County Health Department and a panel member, said the application was very well written and ADDS certainly uses evidence-based counseling services.
Dunn said ADDS has not contacted any of the schools in the county about the program yet, “We didn’t want to put the cart in front of the horse. If we don’t get any schools that want to participate, then there won’t be any draw on the county’s funds,” she said.
The panel approved the application unanimously after about a 25-minute discussion. The recommendation will now go to the Lee County Board of Supervisors for final approval.
The board also heard from Lee County Sheriff Elliott Vandenberg whose department submitted an application through the county to retain the services of a mental health and drug counselor currently paid for through the Mental Health Agency of Southeast Iowa. The counselor is based in Lee County Jail and works with local courts, attorneys, and offenders to help connect offenders with recovery services.
Vandenberg said the service is valuable to the sheriff’s department and helps keep services flowing and assessments being done within the jail system. The counselor, Jordyn Utterback, is losing her position as the state transitions the mental health system to regional care. Her position will be eliminated at the end of June. The sheriff’s department was asking either to have Utterback brought on as a full-time employee of the county with opioid funds reimbursing the department for salary and benefits, which would have totaled about $74,000.
Lee County Supervisor Ginger Knisely said the county board probably wouldn’t be favorable to adding another employee at this time and bringing Utterback on as a contractor may be a better option.
The board also pushed back on the application that said the services would be covered under the treatment for incarcerated populations. Section F of the core strategy allows for providing evidence-based treatment and recovery support for persons with opioid use disorder and co-occurring substance abuse and mental health disorders.
Ross said she didn’t think there would be enough evidence of the required opioid disorder use to satisfy the requirement. She said, however, that converting the services, since the position was being eliminated by the state, to a transition or “warm hand-off” service in conjunction with any specific opioid treatments could make the application more viable under the core strategies.
Vandenberg said they would take another look at a job description. The panel recommended having Utterback appear at a Board of Supervisors workshop to get a feel for what supervisors may have to say about the program. The application will also be forwarded to county attorney Ross Braden for an opinion, and state auditors who review opioid spends as part of the county’s annual audit.