Sudbury’s Advocates for Human Potential Awarded Federal Grants to Tackle the Opioid Epidemic
Grants will establish and maintain community-based reentry, education, and aftercare programs
October 4, 2019- Washington, D.C. – Today, Vice Chair of the House Democratic Caucus Katherine Clark (MA-5) announced that Sudbury-based community organization Advocates for Human Potential (AHP) has received two grants from the Department of Justice totaling $3.4 million. These grants will fund programs designed to help those impacted by the opioid crisis.
“Extraordinary community organizations like Sudbury’s Advocates for Human Potential change lives,” said Congresswoman Clark. “The grants will provide critical resources to directly help people at every stage of treatment and recovery from substance use disorders. I’m incredibly grateful for AHP’s work and that we were able to secure federal dollars to support the success of Massachusetts families in need.”
“We are very pleased to announce an award this week from the Bureau of Justice Assistance for the Comprehensive Opioid Abuse Program (COAP),” said Neal Shifman, President and CEO of Advocates for Human Potential, Inc. (AHP) “This allows AHP to continue the work we have started on this grant since 2017 and support BJA grantees in successfully implementing evidence-based programming that addresses the opioid crisis.”
Pam Rainer, Senior Program Manager at AHP, explained the work of COAP: “The AHP COAP Team has designed a flexible training and technical assistance (TTA) approach to help local communities enhance services provided to pretrial and post-trial populations in jails, with an emphasis on collaboration among courts, community-based treatment providers, and community corrections agencies to support medication-assisted treatment (MAT) and cognitive behavioral treatment programs for those who suffer from opioid use disorders (OUDs).” She continued, “AHP and their partners will provide ongoing TTA (both remote and onsite) to site-based grantees throughout the duration of their BJA grant awards. This includes assisting with project design in the planning phase, developing a profile of each grantee that describes the results of the project, facilitating partnerships with relevant stakeholders, overseeing the data collection process, and addressing issues that may hinder a site’s progress in achieving its goals. The team will also develop a publication that summarizes evidence-based research on outcomes associated with jail-based MAT treatment programs and identifies areas of future research as well as a publication that summarizes the challenges associated with implementing jail-based MAT treatment programs in rural settings.”
The $2.5 million grant will help AHP deliver training and technical assistance to community-based efforts supporting incarcerated or formerly incarcerated populations by collaborating with relevant stakeholders, implementing thorough data collection practices, and publishing their findings. The $900,000 grant will support AHP’s efforts to coordinate a peer-host training program to aid reentry and introduce an assessment program to more effectively measure progress.
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