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Cumberland County earns grant to support treatment for substance use disorder

The Department of Justice awarded nearly $900,000 for a collaborative program based at Cumberland County Jail

PORTLAND, Maine — The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) awarded Cumberland County a grant that will improve collaborative treatment for people struggling with Substance Use Disorder. 

The grant-funded program, which the County is calling “Bridges for ME: Person-Centered Recovery and Reentry,” will provide individuals in the Cumberland County Jail who are assessed with opioids, stimulants and substance use disorders with evidence-based treatments while in Jail and through community reentry. 

The DOJ alerted Cumberland County officials on October 16 that the Department is awarding almost $900,000 to support programming through the County Jail, based on a proposal that the County and several regional partners made earlier in the year to grow and improve community-based treatment for people with Substance Use Disorder (SUD) who have been incarcerated.

The $899,824 grant from the DOJ’s Bureau of Justice Assistance will fund three years of programming through the Jail. Most of the funds will be distributed to partner agencies working with the jail on collaborative efforts to support patients as they are treated in the jail, and then transferred into the recovery community upon their release.

Overdoses from opioid misuse have surged in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic. The Maine Attorney General’s Office reported that overdose deaths grew by 27 percent in the first half of 2020, with 258 Maine people losing their lives from January to June.

Maine Pretrial Services, a private non-profit agency that provides pre-arraignment screening, re-entry and community supervision and case management for people who are arrested in most Maine counties, estimates that roughly 70 percent of the jail population in 2019 had a Substance Use Disorder. 

“Managing treatment for SUD is phenomenally complicated at a county jail,” said Cumberland County Sheriff Kevin Joyce. “But it’s also an opportunity to develop a treatment plan and build relationships for patients with the recovery community in a controlled setting, so the transition out is seamless. If we do this right, we can give people the tools to stay on the path to recovery when they’re released.”

The award is the latest success in the Cumberland County Jail’s run of grant proposals to address SUD through innovative partnerships with area support agencies. 

In 2016 the County earned a significant grant through the DOJ for the County’s “Second Chance” re-entry program, which provides reentry and support services for individuals with both a Substance Use Disorder and a co-occurring mental health disorder. That program is set to expire in 2021. 

In 2019, the County won a technical assistance grant from the Institute for Intergovernmental Research, a national non-profit that specializes in criminal justice and homeland security issues, to build a consistent team of partners and align interests and goals in supporting SUD treatment for incarcerated people. That small grant led to a larger one early this year from the same organization, which established the “Building Bridges” program. The new funds provide recovery housing, transportation and peer support for individuals leaving the jail. Those funds are also scheduled to end in 2021.

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