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Health director outlines two-track plan for opioid settlement funds; commissioners debate Community Foundation role and sustainability
Summary
Public health director Mike Leahy presented a two-track opioid settlement spend plan that would combine internal county investments and community grants; commissioners debated whether to use the Community Foundation to manage grants, how to preserve interest earnings for sustainability, and how to ensure board oversight of award recommendations.
Public Health Director Mike Leahy and ad hoc members presented a proposed two-track approach to spending opioid settlement funds: (A) internal county investments aligned with public-health and justice-system priorities and (B) an external grants track for community partners focused on prevention, treatment, housing, and recovery supports.
Leahy and committee members described expected receipts (the transcript cites a projected approximately $5.8 million through 2038 from distributor agreements, with additional near-term payments from Kroger and potential allocation effects from the Purdue Pharma global settlement). The ad hoc recommended using the health department's expertise in program evaluation and a community grant process for external awards; some members suggested contracting the Community Foundation for program administration and reporting, while others asked whether the health department could manage the grant program in-house.
Key issues discussed included holding the funds in a separately managed interest-bearing account so earnings could support long-term sustainability, whether the county or a foundation should administer external grants, ensuring representatives from courts, law enforcement and community partners were involved in grant review, and building in an annual review to assess outcomes. Commissioners emphasized a balance: some said funds should be front-loaded to address the immediate crisis, while others argued for building sustainable programs that will endure when settlement dollars decline.
Public commenters and task-force members urged timely and targeted distributions; some recommended hiring grant-administration expertise to speed and professionally manage the distribution and monitoring process.
Next steps: Administration and the health department will clarify language about Community Foundation involvement versus in-house administration, define the spending committee membership, and return a revised plan for board consideration.
