POLITICS

Indiana loses funds to treat thousands for drug addiction

Michael Auslen
Michael.Auslen@Indystar.com

Indiana is about to lose funding for a program that since 2010 has helped 11,400 Hoosiers battle drug addiction.

Access to Recovery, a federal grant that expires at the end of the year, has supported addiction treatment in 11 Indiana counties. The program focuses on those in poverty and in the criminal justice system, as well as military veterans.

In the past four years, the state has received $3.3 million through the program, according to Family and Social Services Administration data. Indiana applied for another four-year grant this year, spokesperson Marni Lemons said, but Congress slashed the funding for the program nationwide.

In the last grant cycle, 30 states and Native American tribes received funding, Lemons said. This time around, just six did.

Community Outreach Network Services is one of four Marion County nonprofits receiving Access to Recovery funds. Clinical Director Sheila Williamson, who started the organization in 1999, said the program has been essential.

“In all the years I’ve been doing this,” she said, “it has been one of the best programs in helping those who want to make a change but don’t know how.”

Community Outreach Network Services acts as a bridge between people who want to overcome addiction and the treatment and services that ultimately get them there, Williamson said. It pairs its clients, who must admit they need help, with the services that will best fulfill their individual needs.

Access to Recovery funded some of the organization’s operations and footed the bill for clients' outside services and treatment. Williamson said they received up to $1,400 per client through the program.

At Bethlehem House, one of the other Access to Recovery organizations in Indianapolis, the loss of funding will be felt by clients and employees, some of whom will lose their jobs.

“They know I’m not going to be able to keep them all full-time,” Executive Director Nathan Rush said.

About half of the clients at Bethlehem House have been helped by Access to Recovery funds in the past four years, Rush said.

“We don’t know what we’re going to do,” he said. “Honestly.”

State officials first suspected Indiana could lose the grant money earlier this year, when they heard Congress had cut funding, Lemons said. Since then, FSSA has communicated with nonprofits that rely on the money in Marion and 10 other counties across the state.

Now, she said, FSSA officials are combing through their budget in search of money that could keep the program running, even at a reduced level.

While they wait for a solution, local Access to Recovery nonprofits have formed a coalition to fight for funding.

They’re trying to energize volunteers and donors, Rush said. Williamson said even $500 per client would allow them to stop relapses and save lives.

Until someone finds the money, nonprofits are riding out the year and the rest of the grant, hoping it won't be their last.

Call Star reporter Michael Auslen at (317) 444-6077. Follow him on Twitter: @MichaelAuslen.