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[Music]
you're on
good afternoon welcome to the Joint
session today is Monday May 13th 2024
it's approximately 1 p.m. I'm mayor
Enriquez uh thank you County uh
Commissioners for joining us today for
this session uh we will start with a
moment of silence for the brave men and
women of the United States armed forces
as they protect our our country and also
for the men and women of the Los Cruses
police and fire department as they keep
our city safe 247
365 uh join me in the
pledge I pledge allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America and to
the Republic for which it stands one
nation under God indivisible with
liberty and justice for all
okay the first thing we'll start out
with is jobs of the week Sarah
Rainey good afternoon everyone my name
is Sarah rainy I am the one stop
coordinator for the southwest region of
the workforce Connections
Office we'll get this pulled up real
quick
all right for jobs of the week for this
week May 13th 2024 for the city of Las
cruus we have the youth program
specialist 2 um the position starts at
1877 an hour and it is a continuous
posting at this time we also have a 911
call taker for the mvrda actually there
are several positions open for that um
um job description um the posting starts
at 1872 an hour and the posting ends on
the 30th we have a customer experience
specialist for the gmh housing military
housing at wh Sand Missile Range that
posting closes on the 17th of
July um for pecan Grill and Brewery we
actually have quite a few positions open
there's an assistant manager kitchen
manager expediter there's two positions
two line Cooks two prep Cooks two
dishwashers and two bartenders and
multiple server positions so there's
multiple opportunities at that location
also for the shed they had several
opportunities open there's a breakfast
and lunch line cook and a
dishwasher and also we wanted to include
the Farm Workers um there's multiple
positions with the atams produce
Incorporated um referrals to these
positions need to be done through our
career consultants in our offices so
anyone that's interested in those Farm
positions needs to go to our office over
on Alam Street
upcoming events we have our community of
hope we have that monthly over there we
have the job Readiness um fairs over
there we sometimes have we have
employers we do job Readiness help with
um interview skills resume writing and
and whatnot we help them look for job so
that's our monthly event that one's
coming up on the 15th of this week we
also have our career Essentials on May
28th that is a no cost employment um
service that occurs monthly um and it is
a cross our region as well so those
events can be found on employee andm if
anybody needs more information or needs
to
register and then just another reminder
we're open from 8:00 to 6:00 p.m.
instead of 8:00 to 5:00 we have an extra
hour there for those that need to come
in for extra
Services thank you
everyone thank you sir thank you so much
next we have pets of the
week Amy
doix no
hello of course my name is Amy De Felix
I am one of the rescue coordinators for
the Animal Services Center of the missia
valley and each week I present our pets
of the week I pick and present them and
we always start off with our cat of the
week this week her name is Selena Kyle
like Catwoman her number is 7486 3 and
she says I'm a sweet and quiet girl who
just wants a nice calm loving family to
take me in I'm past my kitten stage but
every once in a while a toy might be my
interest for a little bit I'd much
rather spend my day surveying my domain
taking naps and getting next scatches
for my favorite people and then we have
our dog of the week this week is Ace his
number is
62535 and he says I'm a couple weeks shy
of being at the ascmv for an entire year
so I'm hoping I find my forever family
before then especially at first I could
get energetic and excited when meeting
new people or being out on a walk but I
settle down quickly I can sometimes have
an independent Spirit but but I really
do like to come back to my people for
some pets and Cuddles at the end of the
day and for events this week we actually
have two different offside adoptions
this weekend we'll start off with our
offside adoptions at pharmacia will be
there Saturday May 18th from 11:00 a.m.
to 1: p.m. and then we'll also have
offside adoptions at Sunset Grill this
Sunday the May 19th and we'll be there
from 11: to 2: and then here are all of
our website links our general website
asmv org and then all over our social
media we have Facebook inag stagram Tik
Tok and then YouTube and Spotify Apple
podcast is where we upload um episodes
to our podcast Tales from the POS
side and that is all I have thank
you all right thank you
Amy next for the agenda items 3.1 Opia
settlement uh Community needs assessment
report uh Barbara
comoo good after afternoon city council
and County Commission and welcome to
today's joint work session where we'll
be um giving you some information
regarding the opioid settlement funds we
have
received before I um talk about what
we're going to talk about I'm going to
introduce our presenters today besides
myself uh chief administrative officer
for the city we also have on my far left
uh Sher Thorp the county opioid
settlement coordinator
and also Liz Olivares from NMSU Crimson
research program
manager so today's agenda we're going to
provide you with a brief overview of the
settlement funds of course we gave you
more detailed information at the um
September 11th work session last year
but we're here to provide you with an
update on that uh we're going to go over
uh The Advisory Council form to assist
both the city council and the County
Commission in the development of
expenditure
recommendations and uh we'll talk about
process and benchmarks timelines for
those recommendations to come forward to
you both and we're going to spend the
majority of our time talking uh about
the NMSU Crimson research Community
needs assessment which was commissioned
to support the development of those
expenditure
recommendations uh the other thing I
want to mention is we will be providing
you with quite a bit of information uh
and data today I know that you received
the PowerPoint in advance because of
that um in order to get through the
material we'd like to hold our questions
to the end all of our slides are
numbered we'll be happy to go back to
any slides that you might have specific
questions about uh but that's what we'll
be able to to get through the material
and information for your
discussion so first of all just an
overview of the opioid settlement funds
um these settlements pertain to the
manufacturers Distributors and retailers
there may be further settlements in the
future but at this point uh we have uh
agreements with these entities the city
is slated to receive almost $10 million
and the county $14.5
million um Sunland Park $711,000
over a 17-year period the use of these
funds of course is to address the harms
of the opioid crisis and many of the
uses are governed by the settlement
agreement funds are held separately at
both the city and the county and
ultimately the two separate bodies will
be um deciding on the use of those funds
independently and the the funds received
to date the city has received $3.5
million of the 10 almost $10 million we
will be receiving the county has
received $4 million of the five excuse
me of the almost $15 million that the
county will be receiving so again
following the schedule for the
settlements we have many years still to
receive uh settlement funds but we've
received a a good portion of them
upfront um to
date with that I'm going to be turning
this over to uh Shar Thorp to talk more
about our guiding principles and the
opioid settlement advisory
Council good afternoon Commissioners and
council
members the principles for the use of
opioid funds provide planning and
process level guidance for state and
local policy makers and how to
effectively spend money from the opioid
settlements our five guiding principles
we spend money to save lives use
evidence to guide spending and invest in
youth prevention focus on racial Equity
develop a fair and transparent
process our opioid settlement advisory
Council was built on the John Hopkins
Bloomberg which developed 10 indicators
to assess the Readiness and so we used
those principles to develop our advisory
Council and it is comprised of members
from the community representative of
members from the community and I would
like to just take one moment we do have
some advisory members here in the
audience I'd like to ask them to stand
at this time and just give a little wave
to y'all just so you
can thank you so much for being
here so our people in our advisory are
comprised of like I said people from the
community and um you've been introduced
before but some of the folks are here
today we do have people from all aspects
of our stakeholders and I am so grateful
that they are part of our
advisory a few others from our advisory
Council vital strategies is a global
Health Organization that believes that
every person should be protected by a
strong Public Health System they're the
lead partner in the Bloomberg overdose
prevention initiative and they work with
us as well as other states to combat the
overdose epidemic um they do fund my
position and they also funded the needs
to set
that Crimson research will be talking
about and with that I will hand it back
over to Barbara who will go over over
our process and
benchmarks thank you Shera so I
mentioned that we had come forward in
the September time frame to both the
city council and the County Commission
to discuss the opioid settlement funds
at that time and the establishment of
the advisory Council uh so you'll see
that as complete on our list of
benchmarks uh for this initiative and
then since then we have been working to
establish the resources available in our
community gather data um and develop an
Outreach plan and also to formulate the
framework for the needs and assessment
which uh Liz will speak more about in
detail that's where we are right now
that's what you see highlighted in green
is as conducting the needs assessment
and then providing that finalized report
um so that the advisory Council can uh
formulate recommendations that will come
forward to the city council and the
County Commission um once the city
council and County Commission decide on
the use of funds then an implementation
plan will be developed and of course
we'll have evaluation and Reporting not
only of the funds that are expended but
of course for the outcomes that we would
like to see uh based on the expenditures
that will be made so that is the the
time frame that we'll be operating
under and now I'd like to turn it over
to sharah to talk about how we developed
the framework for the needs
assessment we've been working really
hard to do this incredible work and
we'll be sharing that Liz will be
sharing that here in a minute but our
team's worked really hard with Crimson
research and the evaluation team at NMSU
collectively created a plan and gathered
some baseline data and initial analysis
which we will be presenting and
eventually a finalized public report and
we will be updating data as needed and
with that being said I would like to
introduce Liz Olivas with Crimson
research who will provide us with an
overview of that those data findings
thank
you good
afternoon um my name is Liz olivades I
am with Crimson research at New Mexico
state University we are housed in the
College of health education and social
trans transformation in the Department
of Public Health Sciences and we've been
contracted by vital strategies to
conduct the opioid settlement needs
assessment um it first started and was
led by The Advisory Council Who provided
some feedback on the type of insight
that they would like to to um carry out
and all right so I'm on my slide um so
we started with with three types of data
measures now please note that these data
are very raw preliminary data they have
not been presented to anybody um at this
moment we have not had the opportunity
to yet uh present it to our advisory
Council so you are all seeing and
hearing about this for the first time
today um although I understand that you
are all previewed to the information
beforehand um so the first set of data
was secondary administrative data review
that provided um data from organizations
and agencies that are part of a routine
administrative or operational processes
um this includes data from the msia
Valley Regional dispatch Authority New
Mexico Department of Health
high-intensity drug trafficking area
program um New Mexico health indicator
and data statistics warm lines um mentro
narcotics the Los crs's fire department
and Los Cruz's police departments among
other data
sources um then the second group of data
is from our focus groups which doniana
County Health and Human Services um
facilitated the Recruitment and carrying
out to collect the information from
seven different focus groups and I will
be going into these in depth um but we
did focus on having three to 10
participants at each focus group who are
all recruited from where we identified
hot spots and high need areas of
overdose
and then the last data collection was
from Street Outreach surveys um again
this was all primary data collected by
donana County Health and Human Services
and volunteers that were trained in an
instrument developed by Crimson research
and um to
determine attitudes behaviors and
knowledge and and get an outline for
what we see in our community
now for the secondary data analysis um
we know that New Mexico is among the
highest of drug overdose rates across
the US it has surged in death rates
threefold since
1990 and there's been a significant rise
in deaths linked to methamphetamine and
Fentanyl um in the last more recent
years and of these we know that um 9 90%
of individuals with an opioid use
disorder used two or more substances
within the same year and of those 75%
were associated with poly substance use
um between 2016 and
2020 now we know that donana county has
a population that is more diverse and
higher poverty rates when compared to
the rest of the state in the US and we
have a higher rate among persons living
without health insurance and uh lower
education rates so just so we can keep
that picture of what our what our
population and demographics look like as
we go through these
slides when we assessed the 988 which is
the suicide crisis line and the New
Mexico crisis access line and the
peer-to-peer warm warm line we found
that um there's a 26% increase in the
988 whereas the New Mexico crisis and
access line barely stayed about the same
um but it is interesting that to note
that our warm line and our 88 line use
has
increased we have also seen an we've
actually seen a decrease from 2021 to
2022 in New Mexico however doniana
County saw an increase in opioid
overdose um emergency department visits
from 2021 to
2022 um now this data is limited we
don't have any current data because 2023
data has still not been published and
still preliminary so this is as as
recent as we can get everybody and it's
important to note that our fatal
overdose rate is 26.9 which is much
higher than the overall overdose
emergency department visit
now when we look at the uh fatal
overdose data involved substances we see
that the number one causing overdose um
fatal overdose is fentanyl at 33 excuse
me at 46% for the County New Mexico 33%
so that is substantially higher than
across the state methamphetamine is a
little lower at 22% compared to New
Mexico
25% alcohol is 8% compared to New
Mexico's
11% and cocaine is 6% compared to 8% in
New
Mexico then among the highest impacted
race and ethnicity we have 67% Hispanics
who have had the highest fatal overdose
rate followed by white 28% and then
black and African-Americans 5% in
doniana County now
we've seen in the in most recent years
that this is between 2022 and 2023 we
saw a Statewide decrease at 12% now this
data is not printed out on this slide
because this is that preliminary data
where we're we're still seeing changes
and it could change even after this
presentation today um however when we
looked at donana County we saw 7%
increase and one thing that was worth
noting was that in chaparal specifically
and just from heat Maps we saw that the
rate of Overdose mortality is actually
more than doubled from 2022 to
2023 on this slide we listed out some
identified opioid treatment programs now
this may is not a complete list we may
have some that are missing and some that
that have changed in what they provide
but for the most part outpatient centers
include seven agencies um such as ideal
option Amador Health Center La Clin of
the Familia espira guidance um
alternative recovery and mdoh and Elite
methodone Clinic we have four agencies
that provide inpatient treatment and 11
agencies that offer harm reduction
Services across donana County but it for
this slide what's important to note is
that most of these agencies are located
within Los
Cruses now here we're looking at the
nxone distribution and usage measures
across New Mexico um we do not yet have
data relevant to um donana County in
2023 however we do know that in donana
County there were
2,884 nooon doses distributed compared
to New Mexico's 3585
now these are important as um harm it's
a form of harm reduction um that
includes a practical set of strategies
um to reverse overdose and safe drug use
devices and also prevent drug use
related
deaths all right that ends our secondary
um administrative data assessment now
we're jumping into the focus group
recruitment where again there were seven
groups that participated um we separated
them by key informants and lived in
living experience now because our
participant um count was really low we
merged all of our information into the
two groups so that no individual would
be identified um for having
participated um it was a three we 3 week
recruitment effort um to identify key
informants and lived and living
experience
participants now the key informants
included um individuals who are among
our community leadership law enforcement
entities fire departments and um other
Behavioral Health experts and harm
reduction and social service providers
across donana County and among the lived
and living experience we had individuals
participate
from youth at Los mon high school and um
as well
as Southern donana county Los crues
lgbtqia
plus now this slide is a breakdown of
the demographics of those participants
we had 21 key informants participate
among those uh we had predominantly
First Responders and then Behavioral
Health um experts and Har uction um
experts as
well we predominantly had
85.7% of those participants were white
42.9% were non-hispanic excuse me and
52% were
Hispanic and then among the lived
experience we had a really high uh
turnout rate among the youth group so
they're over rep represented in this
sample where 41% of them were 15 to 17
years old and then
35.3% were between the ages of 18 to
34 and we did also have predominantly
white participants
87.5% and 94% were
Hispanic now the first question that we
asked our key informant and also please
note that all of these um responses are
from our participants we've only
modified the information slightly just
so that the information is presentable
and could be made public um but
otherwise is we use the terms that um
were provided by the
participants so when we ask the
participants what substance or drug
causes the most problems in your
community the key informants responded
alcohol fentanyl methampetamine fentanyl
marijuana and heroin
as the top substances that cause
problems in the
community we included a a quote here by
one of our participants who says the
difference in the last several years of
course has been
fentanyl in question two we asked what
groups are most affected by substance
use and we also provided our
participants with um a glossery of terms
so everyone knew knew how we identified
groups and what substances were referred
to and so
on um of those groups that were
identified young adults were the top
that that came out in our theme thematic
analysis and one of the quotes that we
identified as being significant was I've
been seeing a lot of Youth going into
our facility to pick up syringes pick up
smoking kits because I'm starting to see
a lot of people smoking Fentanyl and
other
substances then second we have First
Responders in law enforcement then the
unhoused and lwi income who are most
affected or identified as most affected
by substance
use question three we asked what
substance use recovery treatment or harm
reduction resources are most successful
in your community and of those themes
that arose we've identified harm
reduction in Naran medication is
treatment which has shown a lot of
promise and success in even our
community case management with a
Continuum of Care followup and reduction
of roadblocks access to treatment and
combination of
treatments we're among the top
themes in question four we asked what
substance use prevention resources are
needed in our
community and among the top responses we
identified home environment and Family
Resources as a number one where where um
the impact of poverty on the family was
brought up and how this is a complex
family issue with no simple
solution then improved case management
and revised penalties for relapse in
permanent Supportive Housing enforce
treatment orders for substance use and
mental health and Criminal Justice
System increase access and availability
of counseling therapy provide a
community mobile health care and funding
effective efforts versus historic
ineffective
efforts um where fund M multiple issues
rather than focusing on just one um
siloed funding is ineffective those are
comments that were made by the
participants we asked our participants
what barriers are there to access
resources the among the top responses
was the medical profession where there's
an overreliance of medication for youth
the medical field hasn't helped the
youth was one direct quote uh lack of
comprehensive care over prescription of
opiates were all some of the sub themes
that were identified uh among that
medical profession
theme then long wait times for mental
health services Transportation early
intervention um which plays an integral
role among case managers providing
comprehensive support uh educational
initiatives to increase awareness and
understanding of substance use issues
stigma cultural norms and beliefs and
lack of
followup then we asked participants what
suggestions do you have for the city
county state about how these funds
should be spent to have a real impact in
your
community again these are the top themes
that were identified and the top one at
education where we should educate about
stigma and accessing Serv es to mental
health one of the quotes said let's get
some mandatory education in our schools
to our teachers to the school support
staff about stigma about accessing
Services about mental health
co-occurring disorders in
general then a centralized facility such
as a city facility with Transportation
case managers doctors whoever needs to
be on
deck a
sustainable programs for the long term
where it when someone suggested
Implement one or two prog programs to
sustain
long-term Transportation focus on
barriers to care such as affordable
Transportation uh community-based
initiatives where the focus on recovery
to work programs similar to Community of
Hope Days labor program was specifically
mentioned um exploration of safe use
sites comprehensive insurance coverage
and early intervention for adolescents
including medication assisted treatment
for them
now we're moving on to the next group of
focus group participants who are the
lived and living
experience when we ask them similar
question what substance or drug causes
the most problems in your community
their identified substances are fentanyl
Blues heroin methamphetamine and
alcohol now the blues is um FDA labeled
this as a laced fentanyl so it's not
just purely fentanyl that people are
taking we asked our participants what
groups are most affected by substance
use they identified Youth and
adolescents where um peer influence lack
of Parental Guidance or they may not be
using substances but are affected by
Family substance use were two of the sub
themes that were
identified um older people and elderly
are overprescribed medications lowincome
and the
unhoused next we asked where would you
family or friends go for help in your
community to seek support for substance
use
issues and of the top themes identified
facilities was the number one and some
of those agencies or facilities that
were named were family and youth
Innovations for harm reduction programs
L cleaning the Familia alansa and Peak
hospital and then programs that they
would turn to are Alcoholics Anonymous
Southwest Pathways which is a program
offered by the New Mexico Department of
Health and Narcotics Anonymous were some
of the sub themes that we found in those
programs um
Rehabilitation support groups Church
barriers and obstacles where resources
are typically far away in El Paso or Las
Cruses participants were talking about
having to go out from their own
communities in order to receive some of
these
Services we then ask participants what
type of experience do you have with
recovery or treatment
resources and a lot of them identified
personal experiences and family members
experiences which included arrests in
and out of rehab
relapse um where four people attended uh
rehab either thems or family member
three people um talked about their
relapse
experience um and people adhering to
these programs um importance of sharing
rehab and Recovery experiences to help
others was um the second theme that um
was mentioned and then the third stigma
and lack of resources After exiting
rehab making the adjustment difficult
question five we asked participants what
type of experience have you had with
harm reduction
resources um people listed Community
recovery when participants said I
recovered my family my trust in my
friends in my work many things my health
and those experiences are what have me
here alive and within the
community um then Community lack of
resources one participant mentioned I
think that these problem s exist as big
problems for example here in the
community of Anthony or in V or Delo
there are no such
programs um then the next theme was
homebased distribution of an
education such as education about Naran
use for family and individuals using
substances and then syringe
exchange we then ask these participants
what might keep someone from seeking
substance use services in your community
participants responded stigma many times
we believe that this is something that
if I go there to alcoholic synonymous
what are people going to think of me or
what am I going to say was a direct
quote from one of those participants
lack of support people need Family
Support people need friends support
people need professional
support and access to care so you know
the people out in chaparal and
transportation is a big thing thing you
know maybe bringing Services closer to
them was another direct quote and then
cultural influence where people don't
always accept or know that they have a
problem and this can sometimes be
reinforced by family and
friends then we ask participants what
suggestions do you have for the city
council excuse me for the city the
county and state about these funds and
how they should be spent to have a real
impact in your community um the top
response was break cycle of addiction
more support services for children of
family members who use substances
resources for
youth Community Mental Health and
Rehabilitation Services early
intervention for youth generational
trauma and improve access to
Services um one of the quotes that I
pulled out for early intervention was I
feel like we should go back to when we
used to use are used to concentrate more
like little kids you know like
Elementary Middle School maybe even high
school still
breaking the cycle of addiction most
support services for children and family
members who use
substances um as a conclusion to the
focus group data that we that we
assessed the top substance use issue
identified was alcohol fentanyl Blues
methamphetamine and heroin at risk
groups are the youth young adults
unhoused in low income and barriers to
resources are medical profession weight
times Transportation early intervention
stigma and access to
care and community- based
recommendations are education
centralized facility streamlined crisis
intervention services early intervention
breaking the cycle of
addiction um these are just those
highlighted themes that were added
up okay now we are jumping into our last
data point which is the Outreach survey
um again we train Ed
volunteers to recruit participants and
they recruited 53
participants um from the streets
surrounding salano and alpao salano and
Amador at Walmart on Walton at Amador
Health Center um the those including
individuals who are currently receiving
substance use treatment for services at
the FYI plus parking lot and these
individuals were asked uh 20 it was a 23
item questionnaire where the questions
were obtained from the national outcomes
measurement system and other instruments
in collaboration with vital strategies
they provided some of their instruments
and tools that they'd used before and so
we we gathered some of those questions
and tried to narrow down which ones
would be the most impactful to inform
our
community of the participants the
majority were male 62.3% and only 37%
female um our participants were
predominantly white
62.3% and their ethnicity was
64.2% Hispanic or
Latino and most of them
were um
71.7% were at least 35 and
older and
52.8% were unhoused and 41.5% were
housed and of those those participants
we asked what ZIP code they reside in
most of them reside in the 88005 zip
code and
then 83% were
unemployed and
41.5% had less than 12th grade education
now these demographics are important to
note because they're the data is not
generalizable to our population in
donana
County we asked our participants what
substances have you used in the past 30
days and the route of
administration of those substances that
were identified
tobacco cannabis nicotine
methamphetamine and Fentanyl and alcohol
were the top um substances that were
reported and the route of administration
the top route was
smoking um and we have actually have the
routs broken down by methamphetamine
Fentanyl and heroin um and only 22% of
our methamphetamine users um used by
injection uh compared to 5% of the
fentanyl users used by injection
we asked our participants have you ever
attended a treatment program for
substance use in the past 71.2% said
they
had and we asked well what influenced
your initial use or relapse of
substance 35.8% of those respondents
said stress was the influence 32% said a
social environment and 15% said a lack
of supportive social networks um but
there were other reasons um such as
covid ADHD depression escaping reality
lack of support negative emotions
boredom anxiety uh lack of supportive
programs and death of family members
trauma costs of recovery to ease the
pain and being unhoused were all reasons
that participants listed for either
initiating or relapse for substance use
we ask participants are you currently
seeking help for substance use 58.3% of
those participants were not currently
seeking
help then we asked them if you wanted to
get help for substance use how would you
look for Recovery or Treatment Services
50.9% would ask a healthcare provider
28.3 would go use Word of Mouth 13.2
said they would seek an agency to look
for Recovery Treatment
Services other s mentioned some specific
agencies such as casinos Community of
Hope Tent City and using a phone peer
support through AA or na um narcotics an
excuse me Alcoholics Anonymous or
Narcotics Anonymous or case worker um
such as one at FYI Plus or ideal options
that were specifically
listed we asked participants if they
were open to counseling or doctor
appointments for substance use 73.2% of
those said that they were open to it and
we wanted to know if if they were open
to Services what type would they prefer
51.4% preferred iners and teleah health
like a combination whereas 40.5%
preferred iners as the most useful types
of counseling or doctor's
appointments um then we asked if people
or if the participants would be open to
medication assisted treatment such as
methadone bup orine 74.3% of the
participants are open to medication
assisted
treatment then we asked participants
what are some reasons or what are the
reasons you haven't gotten treatment
even when you wanted
to and participants identified or 28%
identified as just not being ready 177%
said Transportation 99.4% identified
cost and inconvenient times
then we asked in participants how often
They Carried Naran on them over the past
30 days
57.1% of those participants carried
Naran um and interestingly we filtered
down for th to those participants who
used fentanyl or opioids in the last 30
days and 60% of those carried fentanyl I
mean excuse me carried Naran while they
were using during the last 30 days
40% of those fentanyl users did not
carry
Naran we asked participants about um
their experience with treatment and
Recovery Services most had um reported
having experienced so excuse me these
are were open-ended questions on this
slide and we identified them
thematically such similar strategies as
we did to the focus groups and recovery
program such as Narcotics Anonymous and
Alcoholics Anonymous um substance use
counseling and harm reduction were the
top themes that that arose during that
analysis and then positive and negative
experiences were also identified um we
asked what experience do they have with
harm reduction resources um positive
experiences were the most mentioned such
as peer support needle exchange safer
smoking kits um and then some identified
uh negative experiences limited
knowledge and when asked about barriers
to seeking substance use Services um
participants mentioned emotional state
and feelings lack of information and
resources willingness attitudes and
behaviors were the top themes that
emerged there and then suggestions for
opioid fund allocation um provision of
infrastructure and resources such as
more treatment facilities housing and
jobs then education information center
and regulations were listed
after I'm going to hand it back over to
sharah
now after the slide excuse me um overall
participants are open to receiving
substance use treatment services and
they they are in need of social support
services and promoting safe use among
opioid users is also needed and
limitations of this data again it's not
generalizable more data should be either
continued to be collected and
specifically among opioid substance
users some of our next steps this is
Sher Thor oh we settlement coordinator
hello our next steps working with
Crimson research to complete the report
then present to our advisory Council
identify those data gaps identifying
more data evaluating additional
resources or conducting more Outreach
making data driven decisions opioid
advisory Council will use this data to
start prioritizing core
strategies extending our data analysis
establishing a system for collection and
Reporting and continuing to conduct
evaluation begin researching and
prioritizing recommendations and making
those recommendations to the council and
commission by the end of the summer and
with that I would like to pass over the
discussion portion to Barbara
thank you very much Barbara bomo chief
administrative officer for the city uh I
was remiss earlier and talking about the
presenters I did want to also mention uh
Jamie Michael director of um the health
department at the county she co
facilitates the opioid um advisory
council with me couldn't be here today
but of course has done so much work for
this effort so I just wanted to
acknowledge her uh but at this point and
of course I mentioned earlier we have a
lot of information and data we've
presented to you but we certainly want
to open it up for
discussion okay thank you Barbara and
everyone else have presented a lot of a
lot of good information I'll look to see
if there's any questions which there are
I'll start uh with counsel
Graham thank you mayor uh obviously need
a lot of time to think about this but I
think the primary question I'd like to
have while we have the whole team in the
room would you say that
perceptions of the problem and
experiences of the problem were lining
up pretty well among the three groups so
the First Responders law enforcement
providers those with lived experience
those who are
currently who participated in the
outreach program would you say that we
all kind of have the same view of the
problem and if not where are the main
gaps where certain groups are seeing
problems that others are not seeing does
that make sense
thanks so Li leades with Crimson
research and thank you for your question
now we are still trying we are still
waiting and receiving more data to
identify some of those gaps because we
haven't been able to
Overlay these results but for the most
part as far as the participation goes um
the participants did identify similar
items um we saw very similar Trends
among the key informants and the lived
experience and even the out the street
Outreach so there were there weren't
really too many surprising findings when
we when we came out um but we did hope
that the focus groups would provide some
of that indepth information whereas you
know just transportation in general what
kind of transportation and we are
working through to identify those still
so like I said this is very raw
preliminary um a lot of these numbers
include like one or two individuals and
it was you know the top five theme that
arose so please keep that in mind as you
you know reflect on the the data thank
you uh
Commissioner of course thank you mayor I
do have a question so on uh slide 35 you
were talking about the Outreach survey
part participants and you outreached to
participants um and you listed where
they were coming from so my question is
is did we solicit any participants
outside of the city of Las cruus no
there were no participants outside of
the city of Los crues they were all
within predominantly within the hot
spots within Los crues okay yeah so it
is limited we we don't have any like
surrounding areas from is there a way
that we can look it outside you
mentioned in one of the earlier slides
that chapparel has doubled their OD rate
from 2022 to 2023 I would probably
consider that a hot spot at that point
in time but I do know that um there are
issues outside of the city of Los cruus
when you're looking at the South Valley
um going up towards hatch and so forth
uh and those are concerns because there
aren't a lot of services in those areas
so I would really like to see some data
as to what those areas are saying
because they are 30 minutes away from
the city 30 minutes away from um
services that are more localized here so
I really would love to see those that
data thank you thank
you thank you U commissioner CH Mr May
I'm sorry to interrupt one of our
advisory council members Athena hakabe
also wanted to respond to the question
from councelor CL related to the overlap
of um of findings from the three groups
if if we may you mean councelor Graham
that was for Graham councelor Graham's
question yes yes that' be fine thank you
so much and then commissioner
chapor thank you for allowing me to
speak just briefly again my name is
Athena hakabe and I'm a member of the
opioid settlement advisory Council I
also conducted um many of the Outreach
interviews with indviduals in our
streets in Los cruus um I I wanted to
point out that one of the things that
really jumped out to me here is the lack
of overlap between the Department of
Health Data regarding the age of people
experiencing fatal overdoses versus the
focus that was noted in the focus groups
in wanting to focus on youth Outreach
and youth um prevention if if we're
seeing in our community that the
majority greater than 50% it looked like
I believe of people dying from overdoses
are 50 and older then that speaks to me
of a disconnect right between this um
focus group emphasis on Outreach to
youth um for me as somebody working in
substance use sometimes I feel that
people um prioritize Youth and children
because they feel that it's time that
intervention can happen so that when the
person is 50 years old that they may not
be having these same problems but I just
want to point out that people older you
know people of middle age in our
community are really the ones that are
dying and I think that Outreach focused
on them was not noted in any of the
focus groups and I thought that was a
big disconnect so I just wanted to point
out what came up for me as I was
listening thank
you thank you AO um commissioner chap
thank you Mr Mayor
I work in the court system and so what
I'm seeing is that there's a way to
perhaps reach the 50 plus age group you
have treatment courts that include
juvenile drug court adult drug court
veterans court uh family reunification
and they're really a captive audience
most of them are receiving treatment for
substance abuse whether it be alcohol
fentanyl but as your data shows uh at
least what I'm seeing in court is that
there's such a sharp increase in
fentanyl use and that is so concerning
and it is uh specific to at least in the
county that I know of Oregon chaparal
Sunland Park and so to be able to obtain
more information in those areas I think
would be helpful to the Commissioners at
this point but also uh FYI they have a
team program for kids that may perhaps
be an Avenue to get more answers as to
what's going on
uh but just a suggestion thank
you thank
you councelor Flores thank you Mr Mayor
and thank you Miss Momo and the
presenters I appreciate it I appreciate
your comments Athena Miss Huckabee um I
I see um the information you've
collected is is really good but there's
a big gap there and it touches on what
uh commissioner um chaparo just raised
um we we don't have any young people
here we have the older people we don't
have any data on what the schools are
doing councelor Graham and I serve on
the lasus um Community Schools board and
those schools I hope they spread I hope
they spread well horrible you know I
hope they really grow and continue to
become community schools because it
pulls in the entire Community it pulls
in the parents it pulls in in everybody
and there's a very good book that I
recommend it's called Anna
age8 and you're probably hopefully
familiar with it and it deals with the
trauma that the children go through
people don't grow up uh in happy homes
where uh people excuse me people who
grow up as happy children generally
become productive citizens they grow up
with self-respect respect for others
they know how to work in a
community and and it's it's a story of
Catcher in The Ry you get someone who it
has a dismal childhood where there isn't
any food where there isn't any love
where there's people coming and going
there's a lot of people living like that
and that's the reality our people live
in and I'm not I don't know if you have
I don't know if you covered it if you
did or not but um if you take Apples to
Apples oranges to oranges
you would see that um children who grow
up in happy environments and I'm not
saying happy every day there's a smile
and there's a birthday party to go to
every week and you get a new toy every
day I'm not talking about that I'm
talking about uh a a a home that uh
where you have food where you go to
school and our community schools are
doing such a wonderful job Cheryl love
who's a principal at Dona Ana Community
uh School in on Ana they bust children
in from all over like hatch and whatnot
and kids get on the bus at 7:00 and they
their mission is to make sure that they
have attendance at the school if there
isn't if there's a problem if attendance
problem they go to speak with a parent
and they make sure that that child is
taken care of there are children who
don't go to school and when they're
asked why why why or uh why didn't you
eat your lunch today they Prov lunches
now but back in the day even like maybe
20 years
ago um a child was asked why don't you
eat your lunch she'd walk in with her
lunch bag every day and she'd say oh I'm
not hungry and she separated herself
from other children God knows what
happened to that child but um turned out
that finally uh one School Board member
who would go visit schools just said oh
well um you know talk to her a little
bit more turned out that she carried a
rock in that bag and uh just to make
people think that she had food and God
know I mean again you know forgive me
for invoking that the you know the GW
but um and there was another little girl
who would go to school and this District
uh the uh School Board member here in
Las
crusis um would ask children why do you
go to school oh I like my teacher I like
to color I like recess this little girl
never said anything and finally she
warmed up to
um to Mrs Flores not me and uh I'm not
Mrs Flores it was a teacher and she
finally warmed up to her and said I come
to eat I come to school to eat and our
community schools maybe you know I it's
just my suggestion we really have to
look at the root problem the we're
looking looking at the outcomes of God
knows what I mean and and if we don't
address the root if we don't address the
root of the of the problem we're never
going to find the solution we haven't
really defined the problem you don't
Define the problem you you're not
looking for a solution we're looking at
Stats and you're getting the the data
you get the the data accumulation of the
information that we all see every
day and so anyway so I you know I'm not
a social scientist I'm not you know but
um but anyway I I hope I've expressed
myself respectfully and um and clearly
I'm not sure that I have but if I have
any other comments I'll make them thank
you Mr Mayor and thank
you yes commissioner Sanchez thank you
mayor um Miss Momo and I I guess I don't
know if this I'll open it up I have have
several questions I think the last slide
second to last slide slide 41 it
indicated that one of the next steps was
to establish a system for collection and
Reporting how how do we how are we
collecting data if we don't have an
established system for data
collection I I'm just I'm missing
something so um thank you commissioner
Sanchez Barbara bomo for the record so I
believe what that refers to is uh we
were talking about implementation plan
once the decisions were made by the city
council and County Commission as to how
funds would be expended then we need to
develop a plan uh for tracking and
Reporting not only the expenditures but
also the outcomes uh we don't know yet
how the uh how these two governing
bodies will will direct the spending and
so the development of the data
collection reporting systems might be uh
very customized there might be tools
that we already have uh as part of our
data inventory that we did um early on
as an advisory Council we uncovered the
resources that we have in the community
for data collection it's just unclear at
this point depending on what the
decisions are for the expenditures as to
what we will be collecting and Reporting
and how and that that's part of the
evaluation process that we'll go through
after we receive guidance from the
county uh commission and the City
Council on expenditures
thank you Miss Momo and I and I think I
I I think my concern is is uh as
commissioner chelo nandez had brought up
I think there's a lot of concern because
when when I look at this between the 53
participants that were surveyed and the
38 that were part of the focus groups we
have 91 people that were participating
which is point if I you know rough
estimate 0.004% of this population is
driving what the next steps of this and
particularly when there's not enough
representation from outside of the city
Las crusis I think I would like for us
to get better information to understand
because uh what to help light our way
what next steps are because I I
know the you know one answer or or one
solution it's not a it's not it's not a
one- siiz fit-all solution um because of
the the diverse nature of of the county
I mean we have as was mentioned in uh
chaparal um and areas outside of the
city you know in in the county that are
more rural versus
the the the uh very concentrated
population Center here in the city of
lasus we're going to probably look at
needing different solutions here so I
would love for us to be able
to understand and look at data to have a
better understanding of you know because
I think I I see I I agree with some of
the high high points here
where it it becomes a lot of access to
to the services um it becomes an
education piece there are several things
that are in in here that I think are are
obviously we we need to address but
again like I said as we develop those
next steps I'd love for us to be able to
get that more information um I did have
one other question on um slide 16 and
slide 18 which was about um call or some
of the the increase in calls um here and
for ODS and I didn't know when we talked
about chaparal are these is this data
based off of the residence of the
victims or is this based off of where
the calls
originated okay I'll just speak for my
seat now this is Le leades and thank you
for your questions um the data is from
the entire County so all of the the
calls and we would have to speak
directly to our data source to specify
where those addresses were from because
we did not collect addresses we just got
the the raw the the counts for the total
number of calls and the breakdown per
year so it was interesting to see that
there was a an increase in that but
earlier you asked about um data and
surveillance and data collection
processes and I'd like to say that there
were extreme challenges collecting all
of the data um even within one agency
where one year to the next the the data
is just either entered differently or
collected different L um and this and to
not have 2023 data we can't even speak
to what's happening right now either
because it's still raw data it's it
hasn't been published uh we were
fortunate enough to have some of our
partners share some of those preliminary
findings but it was you know that's the
note it could change at any time because
it's not it hasn't been cleaned up um
but we are very limited in our County
with surveillance um measures and that's
my that's my own intake having work with
some of the data and and trying to find
where we can collect from we have a lot
of Partners who are willing and wanting
I think it's just a matter of having a
more systematic approach to to what's
out
there okay like I said I I I would the
reason I ask is because I would love to
understand if the calls are happening
because people are hanging out in
certain areas or if like I said if their
residences are they're going home and
then you know I guess there's a lot to
look at this data um the other one is on
slide 18 where it we talked about the
the overdoses the uh and then uh the
nxone doses and the reversals because I
I just it's it's interesting that in
terms of the number of distributed like
on table two here that seems to line up
with the efforts that we've had with Don
County to try to get those out into the
hands of residents uh here in the county
which you know the reason I say that
it's about eight to about 8% of of the
the of those issued those doses
distributed are in doni County which is
about 10% of the count of of the state
of of New
Mexico but when you look at the the
reversals it's a stark difference and so
I'd be curious and this might be just as
we kind of go along to have a better
understanding of is this is it just are
we not reporting or are we not getting
them into the hands of the people that
actually need it so and I see this could
be I don't
know hi my name is Athena Huckaby uh
again uh previous to my position at
ideal option I um managed the program at
doni Ana County Health and Human
Services doing Noone distribution and
education and I also do noock Zone and
distribution education throughout the
state and have a contract with bhsd
doing that Statewide um I maybe I should
uh that's not signed so technically not
yet but anyway I do I do work Statewide
uh with Noone distribution and I think
this speaks uh to two things one is the
um you know the emphasis around getting
nxone into the hands of people who use
drugs so um when we get nxone into the
hands of people who are not using drugs
or who are not acquainted with people
using drugs that is all well and good
but we tend to refer to that as
preventative nxone right it sits in
people's drug cabinets it sits in people
cars you know I carry some with me all
the time I've never actually had to
respond to an overdose um we saw in the
slide that you know 60% of people using
fentanyl were carrying nxone which is
great but that leaves 40% that are not
and so um I think that's where you're
seeing that disconnect we have a lot of
emphasis in getting it in the hands of
police social workers First Responders
schools I think that's all well and good
and quite important
um but also I think what's extra
important is that we get it in the hands
of people who use drugs because those
are the people that respond to overdoses
and we would see that Gap close my two
cents great thank you thank you Miss
huab thank you Mr Mayor and commissioner
Sanchez I just did I want to add one
thing with respect to the information on
the residents and addresses I'm I I did
sit through a presentation with heida
where we were talking about the
difficulty of obtainment some of the
data and some of that is is not able to
be um conveyed to us for hippo reasons
um and so it does present a little bit
of a difficulty to pinpoint some of the
some of that demographic data um thank
you thank you Miss Pomo thank you Mr
Mayor thanks uh councilor Karan thank
you thank you for your presentation and
and your work on collecting this data I
know it's an extraordinary effort to
especially get the inputs of folks who
are experiencing substance use disorder
and and using drugs in the community um
I have a couple of specific questions
related to this and then I have a of
course question more than a comment
because you know um this is my JM and
I'm a politician and that's what we do
comments comments more than questions um
but my first few questions relate to how
the money can be spent specifically I
think um uh it feels like there is a
very clear
indication that um humans are going to
solve this problem not buildings um and
perhaps cars or Vans actually I would
say um and Are there specific
restrictions on how this money can be
sent in addressing the needs I think of
Transportation needs I know um Athena
has talked to us about the need
Transportation needs in particular and
the range of services that are available
SL but may not be accessible to folks um
can you talk about any specific
restrictions on how we can spend it in
terms of services please thank you for
the question counselor Karan um again
Barbara Beno for the record um yes I
have a couple of slides here on
allowable uses under the terms of the
settlement there are some general
categories for treatment prevention and
then kind of an an other catchall
category but you'll see some of the some
of the things we talked about today
related to medication assisted uh
treatment for example um um Solutions
within the criminal justice system
that's come up before some training
research and then I had um compiled a
list of some examples of things that we
saw in the documentation related to the
settlement that um are allowable uses
for these funds and you definitely see
that transportation is there um there's
drob job training as well actually when
I when I look through the um the
allowable uses they're quite broad um
but but there are there are there is a
framework uh for that so we would want
we are going to be mindful of that um in
the recommendations uh but here's an
examples of some of the allowable uses
does that answer your question it it
does thank you very much um and I think
and and one other thing just related to
the the distance question I would also
add that folks in Hatch would have to
cross through a border patrol checkpoint
and so in terms of accessing Services
that's also a really important barrier
to consider um I hope that we can think
collaboratively about how how to address
that specific
barrier um in our County but more toward
the the I just really want to appreciate
the work that you all have done and more
toward the comment more than a question
I do think often um it's very easy to
say oh look we as a council we as a
commission we as a group did this thing
one
concrete thing often literally concrete
um as we love to do build buildings and
I would just ask that I hope that we can
consider the diversity of things that
folks have identified I hope that in our
in our addressing these issues we can
prioritize saving lives as is required
but also sort of indicated by some of
the things that Athena mentioned and
really do a range of things because
there isn't we can't build a building
and fix this problem by any means and
and I think I really have hope that we
can that we can come up with a diverse
and responsive um range of things that
are addressing this in community and I
just issue that challenge to my
colleagues to to be complicated in the
way that we that we respond to this and
I thank you all for being complicated in
presenting this information and and
giving us a lot of really good Insight
so that's all
thanks thank you counselor um mayor
protm thank you mayor and thank you so
much to our commission colleagues for um
joining us today um it's great to have
you here and thank you all very much for
the work that you've put in already and
certainly to The Advisory Group um I
just have a few questions and also a
couple comments um I'm curious about the
advisory Council and how often they're
meeting
that hi there The Advisory Council meets
once a month thank you and that was Miss
Thorp for the record once a month
awesome thank you um that's a lot of
work and I just want to commend you all
for your commitment to that for your
commitment to our community
um miss olivades you talked about in on
page 15 you talked about 2023 data not
being published yet I'm curious if you
could talk about who publishes that
data lades at Crimson research and um so
some of this data we like the the one
that I did receive was from Haida the
high-intensity drug trafficking auth
Authority um or area program excuse me
and they get their data from nmdoh and
the Office of Medical investigators okay
so the data is still being cleaned up
and yeah for the same reasons that nmib
best hasn't published anything okay is
what I'm what I'm presuming would be the
limitations to it just cleaning it up
okay thank you for that and then um
similarly on that page on page 16 um
I'm curious
about um you have on here there's no
data necessarily on here for under 25
and I guess I am curious just to miss
Huck huckaby's point about the over
representation of Youth and obviously
youth are important we want to be
preventative with youth right
um and I also understand the other coin
of that around who is actually being
impacted who is actually dying who is
actually losing their homes and their
livelihoods because of addiction and
obviously we need to put significant
amount of resources and harm reduction
not just prevention um because there's
unfortunately too many people there
right and so I am just curious about
some of that discrepancy in the data and
um if are we just not allowed to see
overdose data for minors is that not
public it's public we just don't have a
lot of miners that are that are dying so
it's good news for us yeah however we
did see that donana County had two
deaths among 0 to four year olds in 2022
and four across the state of New Mexico
so half of that came from doniana County
yeah that I mean that's it's interesting
but to Athena's point also the overdose
deaths among the age groups is changes
every single year so it's never like one
concrete group but I did notice the
trend between the 25 to 54 year old
groups and those are the there's those
top three that are repeating every year
um and In The Raw data we saw that
um the top among 20 in
2023 um the highest rates were among 25
to 34 year olds and the second group was
45 to 54 year olds um who had over fatal
overdose right um but it it is
interesting and and I don't think think
it's that I don't think the challenges
are that there's no transparency in the
data I think it's just that it's not
moving fast enough like there we need
more support more people on it to get it
cleaned up and get it ready for us so
maybe that would be a state
recommendation okay but there is the the
data is out on Miners and this issue
it's just the good thing is that we're
not seeing correct we're just not seeing
it happening in in that age group okay
as high so it's lower and I only
reported like the top three because I
couldn't print I couldn't present on my
my nice graphs yeah that were created
but it will be included in the report
thank you um just in terms of more data
collection do we have plans to do that I
obviously if it seems like that's the
ask here today but was that already a
plan Sher Thorp opio settlement
coordinator it is up to the advisory
Council how they want to prioritize with
given the approved core strategies of
OPI wood settlement spending like we
said earlier you all are the first to
hear this information our advisory
Council has not even received this aside
from our members that are here today um
so this month they will be presented
this information and they will begin to
start prioritizing based on the data
that is there so we'll start we'll start
to have those conversations and we'll
start to prioritize within the improved
strategies but um it's going to be I
don't want to say a slower process but
once we start deciding then we present
to the county and city with some of
those recommendations so that's kind of
the process did I answer your question
did you want to say anything about that
Liz I'd like to add that the focus group
content was substantial we did a
yearlong project in three weeks um so
even that data is limited um and I was
hesitant to to report on anything with
any specific language just because it's
so Raw
it's it's just you know one person two
two people we had three people who
represented Southern donana County um I
mean those numbers are very small um we
would need more and I did let the county
know that we'd be open to accepting more
surveys survey data um because our aim
was to achieve 200 participants on that
and then and then see that through so we
are open to receiving more of that and
analyze that to include in our final
report however the focus group work is
substantial and I don't think that we
would be able to provide that in a short
time frame and turn it around for um you
know
considerations mayor proam and if I
might add and and I think we alluded to
this earlier once once we get the final
report from NMSU The Advisory Council as
sherff said is going to review that um
and one of the things that will need to
be reviewed is the presence of data gaps
and whether we're sufficient in order to
to make those uh recommendations so that
will be part of the evaluation of the
final report of the needs assessment
thank you sure I think it's not totally
fair that I can say there are data gaps
when you still need to do that analysis
right but it is clear to me that um
there are some the countyy is very big
and you know I'd love to understand um
what's happening in Sunland Park what's
happening in val what's happening in
Hatch I think that's incredibly
important I also would love to better
understand um our unhoused population if
we have already on here in this
PowerPoint said the unhoused population
is a target population um how how many
focus groups did we do at Community of
Hope and like those are the kinds of
questions that I would love to see
answered I think um you know I'm I'm I
just recently got an email from a mom
who was really who is just just feels
powerless about the kinds of resource
that are out there for her son and last
week I was hanging out with project
light and the social workers there and
folks there and they're talking to me
about also like moms and grandparents
and people are going to their office
just sitting down just wanting to be
heard because this problem is
um deeply overwhelming and I think
people are almost expecting us to make a
little bit of magic with this money um
which also feels really daunting and I
think I think we're all up to it though
and so I think we just have to like
deeply
understand specifically the folks who
are struggling with this right now not
just the informant it's definitely the
folks with lived there is no better
expertise than lived experience in my
opinion um and so I think that if if to
me if there is going to be gaps in the
data it's it's that it's hearing from
more directly impacted people people
who've been through um substance abuse
or people who are currently going
through it and and what the limitations
are of receiving care um so that's
that's um really all I have um I do want
to say that a while ago I read a quote
that said
um oh gosh let me find it because I'm
going
to um mess it up
is said the opposite of addiction is not
sobriety the opposite of addiction is
connection and I think as um this
community has shown time and time again
we can definitely stand next to each
other and to folks who are struggling
the most and I just want to be able to
invest in strategies that are effective
that work um and not just throw people
in jail for substance abuse so um thank
you for the work you're doing mayor
protim if I may I think Miss hucke
wanted to address the focus group uh
comment and question you
had hi uh one more time sorry if I'm
talking too much uh Athena Huckabee uh
member of the opioid advisory Council um
we the f I just wanted to speak a little
bit about the focus groups and the diff
um sorry not the focus groups the
Outreach survey and the difficulty in
conducting that and the skill set that
is necessary to sit down and have
somebody who is unhoused perhaps waiting
at a bus stop and asking them a 20
minute survey about their drug use right
um it's pretty difficult um to get
people to strike that right tone to have
somebody be interested in speaking to
you um I definitely did push um we all
pushed I think for um not only lived
right um I'm a person with lived
experience I've been sober for you know
12 years now but people with living
experience and I think that's really
important
um we only had a few weeks and a few
volunteers and so it was difficult to
get out into those areas of the county
and I'm not personally convinced as like
a middle class white lady that folks in
chapparel might resonate with me the
best you know so I went to the areas
where I felt where people would actually
open up to me and answer questions about
have you used fentanyl in 30 the last 30
days have you used methamphetamine in
the last 30 days where did did you sleep
in the last 30 days these are deeply
personal invasive questions um that are
hard for people to answer and a degree
of trust has to be built so I did just
want to emphasize that I think with the
council the difficulty of conducting
these the building of trust the
importance about sending the right
people into the right communities to ask
the right questions and also you know
showing up with something to give an
exchange we had $10 gift cards available
from Walmart which was helpful I also
provided people with a burrito and a
bottle of water um I literally sat on
the corner in um you sorry I didn't mean
to advance the slide uh you know on
Amador and Solano in the middle of the
street where that intersection is and
met with people so you know I think that
the data that we did get though as you
are saying is not as ranging as we want
it to be the fact that people were even
willing to sit down and answer these
questions I think is incredible um so I
just kind of wanted to point that out um
two other gaps that I actually noticed
while I was sitting here one uh somebody
did text me you know I wish
unfortunately these people that had died
of overdose in the state of New Mexico
this year were able to talk to us you
know unfortunately the dead don't talk
um you know the other thing that I
wanted to mention is throughout all of
this there has been no mention of
pregnant people and I think that that's
a gap that we need to look at as far as
you know services that are available
stigma and things of that that nature so
I just wanted to make those last
comments thank you again for your um
willingness to hear me out as I sort of
sit in the front row and jump in for
comments I just um I'm so passionate
about this and it's so important to me
that the city and the county spend this
money in ways that are going to impact
the population and reduce deaths so I
appreciate you thank
you right thank you AA
Mr I I think uh it was a commissioner
Reynolds yes oh yes thank you Mr Mayor
um thank you m Moma and your team and
everyone for all the hard work you're
doing here to get to help us with this I
I have one quick question and a couple
other
comments um will we lose this money if
we don't act on it right
away because I don't I understand that
this money is going to be here
regardless of how long it takes us to
get to this problem am I right
commissioner Reynolds that is correct
there is not a a time delimited period
to spend the funds beautiful because as
um as councelor Corin said I mean buying
buildings is not going to help us we got
to figure out something different um on
page 16 I'd like to talk about that
slide for a second if you don't mind
oops
that I noticed on page 16 in second
section there you said said that the
race in ethnicity you show as being uh
the people affected by overdose Hispanic
67% uh had the highest fatal fatality
rate and white 28% black African did
anybody else notice that that follows
our census
data so so the so the point I'm making
there is this data doesn't help us if
it's following the Census Data then all
we're saying is we're recognizing that
the population distribution is is
affected equally so we have to try to
figure out different root cause uh
associated with this and say okay so now
do we distribute our our resources uh on
the same as the census or do we try to
find out if there's different root
causes here that we can address with
this money that are going to better
affect the Hispanic population than they
are the white population and so forth so
even though even though this
distribution is similar to the census
more people are still dying so we have
to we have to figure how how to solve
those problems um that was one of them
another another one is I noticed that
um if we have somebody who's disabled
and has a disability they actually get
some some additional support other than
just services like as if for instance if
they're going to college they actually
get uh some of their books paid for they
get you know um some other help with re
other resources that they need I think
as part of this if I heard some of the
data correctly is limitations on um
transportation limitations on access to
uh help and services uh having to miss
work in order to have these Services
done I think we have to think of a
program that's going to also support um
surrounding Services I.E if I'm going to
take off from work in order to get help
with my drug addiction then I need to
have some way to feed myself so I think
we have to think more of a comprehensive
program that says the surrounding
Services may actually end up being more
important and along with the connection
that
uh um protm May protm Pro chemist
V said uh of the the connections are
more important so I think we have to
take a take take step back we need more
data we got to get a whole lot more data
and then we have to Al step back and say
this is not a pro a problem that anybody
has really solved before so we have to
take a creative look at it to try to
find a solution that's going to work for
us and it's not going to work in the
cities the way it's going to work in the
counties the way it's going to work in
other communities and just and I applaud
you guys but I tell you we we cannot
rush into this we've got to do the right
thing and commissioner Sanchez said what
is our plan for collecting the right
data and I think I I agree if we don't
if we don't identify the correct Problem
by correcting the right data then we're
obviously going to solve the wrong
problem so we have to make sure we get
the right information we need in order
to properly identify the problems and
then work on the solutions that are
going to work and then follow the Clos
Loop process because we might try a a
couple of things that don't work and we
need to be willing to go back up and try
some other things and make sure we're
doing the right things thank you Mr
Mayor and thank you all for for what
you've done
today all right thank you uh councelor
FES thank you Mr Mayor and um I do have
a question for either one of you or Miss
bomo well whatever um so on page
47 I believe it was page
47 yes page 47
the last uh dot there youth Focus
programs to prevent drug abuse so that
touches on what I raised so my question
is is anything being pursued in that
or uh what you presented was data that
you
collected
and
so is anything being done about youth
Focus programs to prevent drug
abuse so councelor FLOTUS Barbara bomo
for the record um so these are examples
of potential expenditures that could be
made uh today what we were doing is
presenting data that will help to inform
the recommendations for expenditures
that will come forward so that will be
the part of the next steps of the
process again we'll look at the final
report from NMSU understand of their
data gaps that need to be addressed uh
if there's more collection necessary and
then evaluation recommendations to the
body that might include any of these or
more uh potential uh uses of the funds
depending on what the community needs
are assessed to be so I think uh some of
my colleagues up here um have also uh
focused on the causes so is that being
explored is the money going to be spent
there because I think that Gathering the
data is like looking at the dead horse
almost it's like let's look at you know
what is what the root causes are because
then we you know 10 years from now we're
going to be dealing with this again um
because we haven't reach the solution
and the solution isn't necessarily I
mean it's helpful to those who are
addicted but to prevent people to become
addicted and I'll bet you my bottom
dollar I mean um sure I didn't see any
questions about um and I I don't know if
it's appropriate but I mean to ask you
know why when when was the first time
you ED drugs and what was going on in
your life is that too intrusive is that
not
appropriate it seems to me that I would
like to know um if you don't know what
the problem was again how are you going
to find a solution and so the youth
Focus programs uh to prevent drug abuse
um could then um really you a drug abuse
program could be based on the
information that's gathered so I hope
that happens absolutely that is the
intent and I think one of the things you
saw on the slides was the um impact or
the importance of breaking the cycle we
talked about children who are in homes
where there are uh drug users and
stopping that cycle of use um and I
don't know if any of my colleagues would
like to respond further uh to the to the
comment and question but that was
something that struck me as I saw the
the data and the impact on potential use
of the
funds yes Liz olivades and I could add a
little bit to about the um like the
initial use or relapse we did ask the
the 53 participants that question and
interestingly we had a list from vital
strategies of possible responses people
could answer and when we looked at those
responses we actually saw that that the
other category or like a new response
that one was one of the highest it was
the third highest response so the the
responses were everywhere there wasn't a
standardized reason for anyone and I'm
I'm trying to recall what slide that was
on give
me um I believe 38 on slide 38
excuse me on
37 um where we asked what has influenced
your initial use or relapse of substance
use the number one reason was stress
then the social environment and then in
between that we had an other category
that I did not report here but it was it
was a high percentage because like one
or two people again these are this is a
small group of a small sample size um
that are reporting reasons such as Co
ADHD depression to escape reality um
lack of support um so I my point is that
the reasons are everywhere and I think
that also speaks to our national
challenge I mean if it was a
straightforward answer where it was the
same reason then we might not see these
problems generally um I recognize what
that says oh yes but my my my point I
think I'm not making my point um
35.8% of us up here I'm sure have stress
we don't turn to drugs we didn't turn to
drugs well maybe somebody did I sure I
should speak for myself um but
um yeah so it still doesn't you're
you're you're
stating the outcomes I mean of whatever
their circumstance was and I I would
like to see what the circumstance Dan
was that led to that and then if we
could have a better social system where
our schools are participating where you
know our you know our police force and
my my kids you know back in the Dark
Ages when I had young kids uh there was
a dare program in California I don't
know if there's anything like that drug
abuse or something and the kids did
learn a police officers would go into
the schools and talk to to kids about
this that you know about drugs and you
know alcohol abuse and stuff like that
so that's what I'm referring to and I
hope I I hope um I mean I I think the ga
the information you gathered is
important without a
doubt in terms of knowing what the
objective conditions are but they still
don't address the cause and and I think
that if we identify the cause then we
can then we can have Solutions and a lot
of this addresses well you know this is
what we've done to whatever and I think
uh Miss Huckabee is correct I mean
trying to talk to someone you know to
who's waiting for a bus and you know I
mean anyway but but thank you again miss
Boma thank you ladies thank
you thank you uh mayor proam thank you
just real quick councilor protes I think
D programs have been just historically
debunked as effective so um I did just
want to note just here are my colleagues
and I think some of the comments I think
there is also just a a balance to be
stricken um because I
certain how much money we have is truly
not that much money when we really think
about it and I would hate for us
to use a significant portion of that in
data research and studies and experts
when we need to be using it in the
community right like when they needs to
be going to the folks that are mostly
impacted and so while I do think there
is more room for data collection and
some of these gaps I I also believe that
there is urgency people are dying so
there is urgency to the way that we act
around some of these decisions um but I
I don't want us to get bogged down in
like in all the data collection and
everything has we cannot let Perfection
be the enemy of progress and um and then
you know spend down this money on things
that are ultimately impact ing people's
lives so I just wanted to make that last
comment thank you commissioner
Sanchez thank you mayor
uh thank you mayor PM bomo I appreciate
your your thoughts and I think I I
wanted to I think as we've had further
discussion and I think in particular to
also to council corin's comments about
you know trying to stay away from you
know having to do brick and mortar
solutions to a lot of these um I I would
you know as we look forward and trying
to figure out out next steps I would
love or be open to the suggestion I
think is as the merem had suggested of
having you know steps having parallel
paths because I think we do need some
more data to figure out specifically are
we seeing you know I think with with
some more solutions so I I would support
you know having next steps with some
actual programs or solutions that could
be presented um and then also some
opportunity to look at that data
collection that was going to be
established to figure out you know I
think in in two manners when I say data
collection because I think one I would
love to understand more you know what is
the population we're seeing how do we
continue to differentiate the services
that will be best um you know received
by those in the community but the second
part would be as you as we continue on I
would love to understand some of these
solutions that were that we're inves in
are we getting the results and if not
let's have an opportunity to Pivot
because I think if if um especially if
we're not going to be you know putting
significant investment into buildings
but into programs how do we start you
know really looking at that data and
then coming back because if if with this
combined monies that we have with this
settlement and as they start to come in
through the ye next years how do we
start to figure out okay this year this
worked okay how do we look at next year
what can we re Vamp and and get better
at and so on and I and that you know can
be in the city in the county um but I I
agree with like I said with the mayor
prm's thought of you know let's not sit
here and and wait a long time before we
start you know having some action thank
you commissioner Sanchez and and I'll
just say that alludes back to the
comment from commissioner Reynolds for a
Clos loop system um and back to our uh
next steps in that what whatever the
expenditures are going to be we have to
be very intentional about developing
that implementation plan the data
collection and tracking for the outcomes
that we're looking for and certainly um
bringing that back for potential
adjustments or or pivots as you
mentioned I I I think that's very
important anyone else that's it all
right well thank you thank you all at
this time I'd like to see if there's any
members of the public that would like to
come up and speak or make a
comment uh just real quick not to take
any of your time my name is Robert Menin
um I don't know how many of you have
went through withdrawals how many of you
have went through withdrawals in
jail um we're real familiar with the
aces
studies um you can't tell somebody to
come back next Tuesday at 2:00 in the
afternoon when they're asking for help
they're probably not going to come back
next Tuesday at to as a matter of fact I
know of several people that have not
come back next Tuesday at 2 hopefully
they're none of your family
members okay um we can't put off on
doing something right um there's a sixun
medical assisted detox currently in this
town it wanted to be a 10p person
unit that got shut down if you want to
do something real quick quick increase
from that Sixers to a 10 person
unit that'll help get the ball rolling
because I know of a couple people right
now that are on the waiting
list those of us that are in the field
see the
urgency you know I apologize that we
didn't get you more
data we were limited on our time you
know um we've actually asked to go out
and get more and we're waiting to hear
if we can
so I don't know how many times you got
you guys got to have more data you got
to have more data it goes back to trauma
right continued trauma
PTSD etc etc etc thank you for your
time oh thank you anyone
else yeah come on
up Nicole Martinez director of msia
Valley Community of Hope Mr Mayor
members of the council Commissioners I
just wanted to give some quick examples
of some other things that are being done
across the state right now with some of
the opioid settlement money as you're
considering how to um go forward with
expenditures Behavioral Health Services
Division has a couple of Grant sources
that they have uh dispersed funding to a
bunch of agencies throughout the state
we are one of them one of them is for
people exiting incarceration who are
getting uh treatment and the other is a
Fresh Start program and it's
specifically for people with OP ID use
disorder so when they first rolled this
out it was really a pilot program based
on like an eviction prevention program
so it does target people who are
unhoused trying to get into housing and
people who are about to become homeless
and it was a six-month uh rental
assistance or $10,000 per person and
very quickly you we started this in
November we were like six months for
somebody with opioid use disorder it's
not uh very long um to get stable
especially if you don't have those
social networks in the connections and
things that we were talking about so
we've had some feedback sessions with
them since the Grant's about to end so
talking about longer rental assistance
time um for people and again making sure
that they're getting treatment but
that's been a really great program we've
served a ton of people it's strengthened
our collaborations with our uh service
providers but um there's still some
other opportunities here I think
services are really important again as
we talk about you know that we need the
connections social supports so having
flexible funding to support people in
permanent Supportive Housing Programs do
have opioid use disorder would be really
important uh some other ideas we had
talked about with the county but we
haven't gone forward yet um but maybe
reconsider is doing something like a
harm reduction vending machine at places
like Community of Hope that are hotpots
um and additionally we just want to uh
extend us as a solution hopefully uh for
uh if you do more data collection
through Outreach we have an Outreach
team that asks these questions every day
with our our unhoused clients and can
definitely tag team so we have people of
all races and uh languages and um
hopefully just we want to be part of the
solution so um we have some ideas too
and we know that we are very much
impacted and really want to support
housing in these efforts thank
you all right thank you Nicole anyone
else in the
audience okay seeing
none all right well thank you all thanks
uh the presenters uh thank you again
Commissioners for being here and joining
us and the joint work session I'll look
for a motion to
adjourn so move Graham second by
Flores this is on the motion to adjourn
the joint work section councelor
McClure yes councelor matis yes
councelor
Graham yes councelor cran yes councelor
FLOTUS counc vano yes and
mayor yes
okay again thanks we'll take a 10minute
uh recess and come back with the work
session e