Westmoreland County's Drug Overdose Task Force gets $250K from foundation

With fatal drug overdoses at historic levels in Westmoreland County, officials now have more money to combat the problem.

Officials on Wednesday announced that the county's Drug Overdose Task Force has received $250,000 of an anticipated $435,000 grant from the Allegheny Foundation in Pittsburgh. The foundation was funded by late Tribune-Review publisher Dick Scaife.

“This was a growing concern of Dick Scaife's before he died. Every day, he was reading in the paper about the growing drug epidemic,” said Allegheny Foundation Chairman Matthew Groll. “The task force developed a good approach to the problem, so the trustees decided to make the grant to help this effort. Hopefully, it will make an impact.”

The task force will use the money to hire an executive director. The director will be tasked with:

• Coordinating the education of physicians regarding prescribing practices and distribution of drugs.

• The dispersal of naloxone — a medication that reverses the effects of an overdose — to emergency responders, schools and family members of addicts.

• Overseeing drug abuse education programs.

The grant also will be used to establish a drug and alcohol abuse hot line and pay for other community outreach efforts. The hot line, which will receive calls from 6:30 p.m. to 2:30 a.m. daily, is expected to be operational by the end of February.

“We need all the help we can get as we try to combat this scourge,” said Westmoreland County Commissioner Charles Anderson, a member of the task force.

The number of fatal overdoses in the county has risen dramatically during the past decade. Coroner Ken Bacha reported 50 fatal overdoses in 2005, and the number has risen nearly every year since then. In 2014, 87 deaths were attributed to drug overdoses. Last year, the number soared to 113 confirmed deaths with 12 cases still under investigation.

The task force was mandated to cut the county's fatal overdoses in half by 2025.

“We're fighting an uphill battle at this point, but the goal is fully attainable,” said Tay Waltenbaugh, executive director of Westmoreland Community Action, the host agency for the task force.

The nonprofit will be charged with conducting interviews and hiring the task force executive director in the next few weeks.

The grant is the first substantial funding the task force has received since its inception in 2013. It is expected to cover the next three years of operations of the task force, with the executive director to focus on the drug overdose problem.

The director's duties are modeled after a program called Project Lazarus in Wilkes County, North Carolina, which is said to have reduced the number of drug overdoses in that community by 61 percent from 2009 through 2011.

Efforts to find funding beyond the Allegheny Foundation grant will be ongoing, officials said.

Commissioners Chairwoman Gina Cerilli said there are no plans for the county to provide funding for the task force, but such a proposal could eventually be considered.

Commissioner Ted Kopas said the grant funding will enable the county to focus its efforts on fighting the drug problem.

“It's very welcome and very needed. It's no secret the challenges Westmoreland County faces with overdoses,” Kopas said.

Rich Cholodofsky is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at 724-830-6293 or rcholodofsky@tribweb.com.