Contract Review Committee awards opioid-prevention grant to Artist Association; selects Fairwinds for treatment award after second vote

The Nantucket Contract Review Committee voted June 27 to award the opioid-prevention grant to the Artist Association and, after further discussion and a second motion, to award the opioid-treatment grant to Fairwinds.

The prevention award was approved 3–1 on a roll call: Sue Mintonan voted No; John Beloche, Linda Williams and Committee Chair Veronica Bolchick voted Yes. The treatment award initially resulted in a 2–2 tie and failed; the committee took additional discussion and then passed a second motion 3–1, with Veronica Bolchick casting the lone No vote. The transcript does not specify the dollar amount for the prevention award; the treatment award was recorded as $35,000.

Why it matters: the grants are part of Nantucket’s opioid-response funding for prevention and treatment programming. Committee members debated program specificity, measurable outcomes and whether the single-award, all-or-nothing format prevented smaller programs from being funded.

Committee members said the rubric used to score applications did not map well to the targeted nature of the opioid grants. The…