The Addiction Abatement Working Group’s plan to contribute half of the town’s $620,000 opioid settlement funds to a pool of seven towns served by the Nashoba Associated Boards of Health received unanimous support from the Select Board at its Aug. 26 meeting. The money will be used to fund a suite of addiction abatement services for the region from a yet-to-be-chosen contractor. The boards of the seven towns will vote on an intermunicipal agreement defining the collaboration when the language is finalized.
The other towns in the pool, which is called the Nashoba Opioid Abatement Collaborative, are Littleton, Bolton, Shirley, Ayer, Pepperell, and Groton. In addition to Harvard’s contribution of $310,000, Littleton will contribute its entire settlement of $393,000. The other five towns will also contribute their full settlements, which total about $210,000. Those five towns, which are all in regional school districts, received small settlements because the allocation formula used for Massachusetts penalized towns in regional school districts.
Brad Holub, chair of the working group, told the board the plan to contribute to the pool “speaks to a townwide survey that had very strong support for a regionally minded approach” to spending Harvard’s outsized share of opioid settlement funds. The other half of Harvard’s funds will be used for smaller projects that will cost less than $10,000 to stay under procurement law limits, as well as larger projects that have yet to be identified. Holub told the board that no proposals for any other projects have been submitted to the working group yet.
Holub also asked for the board’s input on the draft of the intermunicipal agreement that will govern the collaborative’s expenditures and on the request for proposals for a contractor to provide the opioid abatement services the collaborative seeks.
Select Board member Ahmet Corapcioglu asked about the makeup of the collaborative’s advisory board, which will be responsible for reviewing and approving all proposals and contracts. Holub said each town will assign a member and an alternate. He added that the agreement does not yet include a statement regarding desired skill sets and backgrounds for members, but there is time to add it. Select Board Chair Kara Minar said such a statement should be added to the agreement, along with language that would require annual reports to be sent to the various Select Boards of member towns. Corapcioglu also suggested that the terms for members be added to the agreement.
Select Board member Eve Wittenberg asked why Harvard was only putting in half of its settlement funds. Holub said the other towns weren’t comfortable asking Harvard to contribute all its large settlement. He said the working group felt it would be good to use some of the money in Harvard, or to share some with neighboring towns that are not part of Nashoba collaborative. He said that regional effectiveness will even be a consideration in evaluating the mini grant proposals that the group is seeking.
Holub will take the board’s input back to the collaborative, which was set to meet at the end of last week. When all seven towns are satisfied with the wording of the agreement, Holub will pass it on to town counsel for final approval. Once the agreement is approved and signed by each town, the request for proposals will be sent out.
