The City of Albuquerque and Bernalillo County have teamed up to create a strategic plan on how to spend millions of dollars in opioid settlement funds, and they’re hosting a series of meetings to get community input.
This week’s meeting was held in Bernalillo County Commissioner Walt Benson’s district, at the Raymond G Sanchez Community Center.
Benson said everyone in attendance had been impacted in some way by the opioid crisis.
“So all of them have real world experience. It's not just, you know, philosophical Ivy tower stuff. These are folks that have gone through the tumult of and the heartbreak and tragedy of this addiction process. And so it was just, it was amazing feedback that we were getting.”
He said the community made it clear that lawmakers and local politicians need to put aside their own thoughts and instead listen to local experts and providers in crafting a plan to fight the crisis.
“I think it's easy for the commission to kind of charge ahead with a new idea without relying on the experts and these community members were saying, take a step back, rely on the experts,” he said. “They have real world experience. They've dealt with folks coming out of addiction and struggling with addiction, and they've seen the good, the bad, the ugly, what works, what doesn't work.”
Consultant Sindy Balaños-Sacoman is running the meetings and developing a report on how the funds should be spent, which will be submitted in October.
She said attendees also brought up the importance of Certified Peer Support Workers in helping the newly sober navigate recovery, and they want to see naloxone made more easily available, along with information on how to use it properly.
In addition to the town halls, Balaños-Sacoman said there will also be small private listening sessions limited to 10 people. Spots are still available for those.
You can sign up for one of the sessions and find more information on future town-hall meetings on the county’s website.
The money is coming from settlements with opioid manufacturers and distributors that guard them from lawsuits, but also force them to pay out billions of dollars to state and local governments around the country.
The majority of the money has to be spent fighting the opioid epidemic.
The next meeting will take place next Thursday, July 25th at the Manzano Mesa Multigenerational Center at 501 Elizabeth SE.
Support for this coverage comes from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.
