Paul Bass Photo
The scene on the Green during August’s K2 overdoses.
Mayor Toni Harp returned from a trip to the nation’s capital with a plan to boost how New Haven tackles drug addiction.
Harp made the Washington trip last week, meeting with Elinore McCance-Katz, head of the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), a division of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.
They discussed New Haven’s effort to combat drug addiction in the wake of last year’s mass K2 overdoses on the Green as well as ongoing opioid overdoses common to communities nationwide.
Harp said McCance-Katz told her about a new pot of grant money the agency was announcing later that week to help cities tackle drug addiction in creative ways. McCance-Katz suggested that New Haven apply.
Harp said Monday her administration indeed plans to seek a grant under the program to help New Haven figure out how to coordinate the work of some 50 “actors” that tackle the issue, from government agencies to Hill Health Center to Connecticut Mental Health Center.
In addition, the city plans to renew a request to the state Department of Mental Health & Addiction (DMHAS) Services to fund a “street psychiatrist” in New Haven who can prescribe medication while making rounds of areas like the Green where addicts congregate.
The Malloy administration had expressed support for the idea last year but it was unclear who would lead DMHAS after the transition to a new administration. Now that the same commissioner, Miriam E. Delphin-Rittmon, has remained at the helm, Harp said, she’s confident that the deal can be struck. (Delphin-Rittmon also teachers at Yale School of Medicine.)
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WNHH’s “Mayor Monday” is made possible with the support of Gateway Community College and Berchem Moses P.C.