Lexington city officials are setting up the framework for spending opioid settlement dollars. The central Kentucky government has almost three million dollars in hand from the class-action settlement with a drug manufacturer. Kacy Allen-Bryant is the commissioner of social services. Allen-Bryant said the focus is on abatement.
“Some of these side effects that we’ve had because of the opioid epidemic, where it’s from people being homeless or children being orphans or mental health issues, whatever it is, trying to help rectify those as well as prevent future use of opioids, what can we do,” said Allen-Bryant.
2022 will likely go down as the year with the highest number of overdose fatalities in Lexington at 210 deaths. There was a slight decline in 2021 with 193 fatalities, but the year before Lexington experienced 209 overdose fatalities.
A commission is being formed to make recommendations on how to spend the abatement-focused money. Allen-Bryant said there are lots of ideas.
“There’s been lots of suggestions from the community. And that’s great. We love all the anecdotal data. Now we’re going to be looking at the hard data to say this is exactly what people need. This is what is happening in our community because of opioid use. How can we prevent it also in the future,” said Allen-Bryant.
Before making any firm decisions, Allen-Bryant said a needs assessment will be conducted. The Lexington Council will be asked to approve the commission framework and, in time, consider recommendations on how to spend settlement funds.
