SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (South Dakota Searchlight) — The latest round of funding from a nationwide opioid settlement will pay for a mobile street medicine clinic, addiction treatment training for primary care doctors, and recovery coaching for incarcerated people and recent inmates.
The money will also help fund a mobile crisis team on the Cheyenne River Reservation, expand addiction treatment for juveniles and pregnant women, and fund four substance use interventionists for the Sioux Falls School District.
The money comes from the makers and sellers of opioid painkillers linked to spikes in addiction and overdose deaths. South Dakota is expected to receive about $99 million in settlement funds through 2038. The state’s collected $32.8 million so far, with 70% of the money going to the Department of Social Services for disbursal around the state and 30% going directly to localities.
Republican Gov. Larry Rhoden appeared alongside Department of Social Services Secretary Matt Althoff to announce the awards on Thursday at the downtown Sioux Falls library.
“We have both an opportunity and an obligation to invest these dollars wisely and in a way that makes a real difference in our communities,” Rhoden said.
The latest $7.8 million in awards represent the second round of “transformative” grants — up to $2 million each — given out since the state revamped its opioid settlement funding framework to create a tiered system. The state also offers mid-sized grants of up to $50,000, awarded twice a year, and grants of up to $5,000 to address immediate needs.
The state got $67.5 million in “transformative” grant requests between November and January, according to a report delivered to the Legislature in March.
The Department of Social Services and an Opioid Advisory Committee make the call on which projects get the greenlight. They prioritize ones that fill a known gap in treatment and services for those affected by opioid use disorder or at risk of being affected, Althoff said. Sustainability and measurable outcomes are also prime factors.
The current crop of awardees “hold great promise of filling gaps” already identified by the department and opioid committee, Althoff said. A more thorough statewide needs assessment, paid for by $325,000 from the settlement, is nearly complete, he added.
One of the awardees, the Sioux Falls nonprofit Face It Together, offers in-person addiction recovery coaching to people in Sioux Falls, Pierre and Watertown, and virtual coaching to clients anywhere in or outside the state.
It’s been sending its recovery coaches into prisons in Springfield, Yankton and Pierre for about two years. The work starts six to nine months from an inmate’s release and is meant to continue afterward, said Megan Colwell, the organization’s director.
“We’re coaching them in the incarceration setting, building that trust, building some of the core skills that will help them be more successful,” Colwell said.
That work is paid for through a private sector grant meant to address the needs of inmates in rural jails and prisons. With its $920,700 from the opioid settlement, Face It can hire more coaches and expand its reentry work to inmates in Sioux Falls. Coaches are “at capacity” Colwell said, but the money to hire more of them “just wasn’t there” without the opioid settlement dollars.
The state has awarded $1.8 million in large-scale grants across four projects since the start of the state’s current fiscal year in July, according to a report delivered to lawmakers in March. The state has awarded $334,500 in smaller grants to 13 projects in that same time frame.
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