Community Priorities: Overdose Settlement Funds
Launched in December 2024 and running throughout January 2025, The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) initiated outreach and educational efforts to invite public feedback on overdose prevention priorities in the community. The insights provided were utilized to inform the proposed allocations of opioid settlement funds presented to the Board of Supervisors last month in the form of a spending plan.
Twenty-two outreach initiatives were undertaken, including hosting a listening session for youth, launching a dedicated Opioid Settlement Fund webpage, providing a downloadable presentation, presenting to and answering question at nine separate community stakeholder gatherings, posting announcements in this and other local public health focused newsletters, emails to HHS’ and partner listservs inviting engagement, and conducting an online community survey, available in three languages.
Over 33,000 people were invited to explore the new opioid settlement fund webpage, review the presentation, and asked to take the community survey. More than 950 individuals attended live presentations, opened the OD Free Marin newsletter on this topic, and/or visited the opioid settlement fund webpage during the window when the survey was active. From that engagement, one hundred and twenty four responses were received from community members through the survey which were reviewed by Health & Human Services.
Respondents had been asked to rank order a list of high-impact opioid abatement activities designed to expand the County’s capacity to support overdose prevention. Survey takers were also asked to identify at-risk populations in Marin needing expanded resources, as well as invited to offer their own comments and recommendations through open-ended questions and responses.
Visit the OSF webpage to learn more about survey results, community involvement, priority activities, and the allocation of settlement funds. The opioid settlement fund webpage is updated monthly or whenever settlement funds are received by the County.
