Essex County Outreach serves the 34 cities and towns within the county in providing assistance with outreach and follow ups for SUDS

The City of Newburyport is applying for funding in the amount of $1,600,000 to support the existing Essex County Outreach (ECO) program. Ninety-eight percent of this budget will support the allowable use category of law enforcement and first responder deflection and diversion programming and 2% will support real-time data collection . This project serves the area of Essex County, which has a population of 785,205. ECO is a police directed post-overdose outreach model and serves to make treatment more accessible for those struggling with Substance Use Disorder and their families. The key program components of this proposal are informed by a recent Sequential Intercept Mapping Model process that ECO completed as well as lessons learned from the first four ECO program years. The FY 2022 ECO COSSAP grant prioritizes the following strategies that have emerged as gaps in resources: (1) program coordination/administrative support; (2) funding for police overtime for post-overdose follow-up visits; (3) clinical/child advocacy services; (4) housing and transportation resources to support clients in early stages of recovery; (5) addiction and recovery training for police officers; and (6) expansion of access to harm reduction supplies/kits.

This project includes partnerships between the 34 police departments in Essex County, the Essex County Sheriff’s Department, as well as all local treatment providers and community service providers. ECO is administered by the Newburyport Police Department along with the Essex County Chief’s Association. Kelley Research Associates (KRA) will serve as the research partner for this project and also maintain the Critical Incident Management System (CIMS) software which records real-time data on all overdoses that occur in Essex County. CIMS also manages and documents incident follow-up outreach visits to determine the success at connecting individuals with treatment services, shares information across communities using a county-wide incident notification system and provides real-time reporting tools. Previous COSSAP funding from 2019 allowed ECO to establish long-term viability. This proposal signifies a strategic expansion of the ECO model to fill critical gaps in current resources and services.