Mayor's Office will add EINs to opioid restitution grant agreements, board notes report

The Baltimore City Board of Estimates on Oct. 1 received a memorandum from the Mayor's Office of Recovery Programs noting that employee identification numbers (EINs) will be included in opioid restitution fund grant agreements going forward and will be added to seven previously approved agreements.

Shamaya Kearney, Deputy City Administrator and former chief recovery officer, told the board that the Mayor's Office of Recovery Programs is the entity responsible for awarding opioid restitution grants. "To ensure that agreements are executed with the correct legal entities and that each organization is associated with a federally recognized permanent identifier," Kearney said, "the recovery's office will include employee identification numbers on all organizations, for all grant agreements for these organizations that will be included as exhibit C, in our grant agreements."

Kearney said seven agreements that had previously come before the board lacked EINs; the office will amend those records to add the identifiers and will include EINs in future agreements. The board "noted" the memorandum; no vote was required.

Why it matters: adding EINs ties payments to specific legal entities, which officials described as supporting accurate grantee tracking and accountability for funds drawn from the opioid restitution process. The memorandum was presented as an administrative improvement to contracting and grant‑monitoring procedures; the board did not discuss specific grantees or dollar amounts during this agenda item.