Minutes- February 2016

I.  Welcome- District Attorney Tim Cruz & Sheriff Joe McDonald

II.  Subcommittee Reports

A.  Public Safety- Chief Botieri

•  Highlighted best-practice in Plymouth: Project Outreach
  • Focusing on the treatment and prevention piece

• • First met with stakeholders: identified 12-24 hrs after overdose being most crucial

• Created an on-call list for each day which started in December

• 1 month sign-up was set up for outreach
• Street crimes officers (7) visit homes to meet with individuals who recently overdosed to try and provide a bed for treatment – only Plymouth residents
  • Note: not every overdose gets a follow-up visit; warrants are run before going to offer help at a home – if there is one, they do not go
• No one turns them away – most likely because of the stigma; this stops many people from getting help

• They have been lucky with getting beds: 6-7 times already
• There has been zero funds needed for the program so far

• Learning outcomes:
  • If you bring the resources to them, it reduces the stigma
  • If they say they don’t want you to visit their home, it is often a cry for help – these individuals have taken beds when visited at their homes
• Goal: To get the county on the same page with this initiative within one year
  • Plymouth is moving into Middleboro and Carver – all three communities are collecting the same data; our goal is for the county to collect all of the same data
  • June/July offer to other towns *go slow
• Challenge: How can we support smaller PD’s in June/July to take on the same initiative?
  • Provide minimal training
  • Sheriff suggested support through the Academy
• Chief suggested this should be the group where we bring best-practices to the table

B.  The Education Subcommittee

• is hoping to bring local college presidents and K-12 superintendents to the table (they have been added to the flow chart)
• President Clark will be gathering higher ed institutions together in March
• The education subcommittee would like to assess the faith-based curriculum to see how they can integrate it if possible

C.  Legislative Subcommittee

•  Monica Mullen, District Director for Senator Vinny deMacedo
  • Legalizing Marijuana – Senator deMacedo’s Fact Finding Mission – Colorado
    • 7-9 senators went – eye opening experience
    • Ongoing problem, unintended consequences
    • Marijuana sold in 500 plus retail shops – low income areas/tourism targeted
    • Huge black market – other states coming in which makes up 45% of sale
      • Individuals can make $60,000/year which is not taxed and social security is not taken out
  • Ballot question has enough signatures and if so, it would become legal
  • Cash business aspect
    • It is an all cash business because it can’t come across state lines
    • Suggestion: start slow in MA with baseline data to compare to if it becomes legal
  • Additional problems include drugged driving, target on kids, pesticides, purity of THC
  • Revenue produces more costs than raising money

• Sheriff: Important to note that marijuana is still a violation of federal law
  • Federally, we are not enforcing these laws
  • We are in a presidential election – we hope to have some influence on a national level if possible to enforce these laws – Dept. of Justice
• S2022 – An Act relative to substance use prevention
  • Biggest push back:
    • Doctors holding person against will
    • Amount of prescriptions given – they want 3 day maximum, but agreed informally on 5 day maximum
• Dr. Muse’s perspective: the law will change nothing by putting a limit on the number of days for prescribing
  • Doctors can up the # of pills within the 5 day limit
  • The law would need to include follow up by doctors if meds are prescribed for more than 5 days

• House and Senate bill – conference committee
  • They can choose between House & Senate bill, but won’t be able to add anything

• Robert Sullivan, Chief Legal Counsel, Representative Garrett Bradley
  • House Bill: 2 amendments – revises section 35
    • This would extend it – warrant in effect for 5 days; no burden on police dept.
  • Dashboard – real time updates relative to treatment beds/services and section 35 procedures

• Any highlights to add are welcome – more down the line on this

D.  Data Collection Subcommittee

•  Drug Free Communities Survey
  • Five communities: Whitman – Hanson, Rockland, Brockton, East Bridgewater
  • Combination of YRBS, CTC survey – 17 questions, opportunity to add 10 questions (mental health, nutrition, etc.)

• Provides baseline data

• Data collection is helpful in order to: make your case, place your resources where the need is, zone us in, get people’s attention

• We now have hospital data broken down on the # of opioid overdoses
• Goal: To think about an annual report for the taskforce
• A series of trainings will be planned starting in May and will be hosted at BSU
  • Trainings can be pulled from the talent in the room: speakers bureau
• A DFC presentation recently took place at the Sheriff’s Dept. for local community coalitions interested in learning more about the grant process
• Kingston coalition just started up – support given by the DA’s office
• Hingham is starting a new drug court
  • There is only one trial court in the county that does not have a drug court: Wareham
  • There has been a shortage of drug court PO’s and judges

III.  Revised Flow Chart of our Task Force Model – Changes

• Ed Jacoubs overseeing the Data-Collection Subcommittee as well as the Community and Faith-Based Coalitions
• • He will be reaching out to set meetings with these groups
  • The faith-based coalition is interested in bringing together churches to educate them around these issues: consequences à choices (May/June)

IV.  JAG Update

• The DA’s Office was awarded $165,000 through the JAG EOPPS Grant which will help to fund the efforts of the taskforce:
  • Training for law enforcement and ADAs
  • Prosecution $$ – heroin, fentanyl cases
  • Police overtime
  • Presence of diversion officers at community coalition meetings
  • Class A investigations; technology – phones are key in investigations
  • Website for the Plymouth County Drug Abuse Task Force

V.  Open Discussion

•  Dr. Muse questioned whether or not we are going after physicians – DA mentioned it is often hard to prove it
  • He also questioned the issue with marijuana being a gateway drug – the laws are not severe enough and are we doing anything more about this?
    • The vast majority of marijuana cases are not taken seriously
    • There would need to be a legislative change
    • Wrong message sent to kids – consequences are much more severe for alcohol use than marijuana

• Joanne Peterson mentioned her concern regarding treatment facilities sending patients home with dangerous combinations of drugs after the fact that they have been detoxed – curing patients with methadone should be no cause for celebration
  • There has been much pushback on this opinion, but she sees treatment providers trying to treat the problem with the problem

VI.  Adjournment