ANNAPOLIS, MD – Heroin coordinators with sheriff’s departments in the tri-county area will be receiving almost $120,000 in state grants with the goal of helping eradicating the heroin epidemic across the state.
“Throughout Maryland, from our smallest town to our biggest city, heroin is destroying lives,” said Hogan. “A coordinated law enforcement and treatment response is essential to our administration’s ability to help fight this epidemic and provide our citizens with the lifesaving support they need.
Governor Larry Hogan today announced that his administration is providing $3 million in state grants to law enforcement agencies in every region of the state. $931,371 will go toward funding a heroin coordinator in those agencies, while a $2,070,397 will go to nine jurisdictions to continue the Safe Streets Initiative.
Safe Streets is an offender-based program that tracks down and arrests the most serious, violent, and repeat offenders. The program connects those offenders struggling with substance abuse to drug treatment, health care, education, and other services.
This year, five Safe Streets sites will be funded to hire peer recovery specialists to integrate treatment into the model.
These heroin coordinators will work to ensure that every drug seizure, arrest, and investigation is documented and uploaded into extensive shared databases to give us a clear picture of the paths these deadly drugs take to get into our communities, said Hogan.
“And our peer recovery specialists will work to ensure offenders with addictions get the treatment and support they need to get on the road to recovery,” said Hogan.
Both programs will support the recommendations of the Heroin & Opioid Emergency Task Force, which released its report after holding regional stakeholder summits to hear first-hand about the ravages of the epidemic on communities throughout the state.
“Governor Hogan and I are committed to the Safe Streets Initiative because it is a model program that works, and we’re pleased to be able to integrate a drug treatment component into our Safe Streets program—an important recommendation by the Heroin and Opioid Emergency Task Force,” said Lt. Governor Boyd Rutherford, the Task Force chair.
“Identifying offenders who have an addiction from the moment they are arrested gives us the time we need to help them turn their lives around,” said Rutherford.
“Until now, it was typical for law enforcement agencies to conduct and analyze their investigations and information on the illegal drug trade independently and in their own jurisdictions,” said Glenn Fueston, executive director of the Governor’s Office of Crime Control & Prevention, which administers the Safe Streets funds.
“This is no longer the case. The Heroin Coordinator Grant program will promote an integrated law enforcement and investigative strategy among all Maryland jurisdictions through extensive data-sharing. This, in turn, will advance statewide investigations and prosecutions of drug traffickers, as well as referrals for treatment for individuals struggling with addiction,” said Fueston.
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