An external report examining the Prescription Opioid Settlement Distribution Commission’s grant process is expected in October following fraud concerns.
After grant recipient Code Purple was flagged for potential misuse of funds in June, Attorney General Kathy Jennings recommended independent contractor Social Contract review the commission’s grant process.
In July, Jennings said Social Contract was expected to deliver two reports — one in August and one in September — providing recommendations for installing better guardrails to prevent future fraudulent incidents.
Executive Vice President Drew Fennell says Social Contract has delivered some drafts to the commission as of Tuesday.
“The drafts that we have given to them so far are our research annexes. So there are three different ones that comprise all the national and local research around best practices, both in distributing and monitoring the grants, but also what kinds of activities have we seen so far," Fennell said.
The commission says it’s likely those reports will be delivered to the full body at its Oct. 28 public meeting, along with a launch of the commission's own stand-alone website.
The commission’s Governance Committee Chair Dave Humes hopes the review process can move as quickly as possible, noting the commission continues to sit on funds following Jennings recommendations to temporarily pause further grant distribution until Social Contract's reports are reviewed.
“I think we gotta work harder on getting some of these funds out because we're gonna go through this year – $41 million sitting in the bank. We've only gotten $1.9 million out, and I just don't want to see us go backwards with overdose death rates," Humes said.
Updated data shows suspected opioid overdose deaths to be consistently lower each month this year than the prior two years, with a suspected number of deaths to be 207 so far this year — last year, opioid deaths totaled 281 by July.
The recently released 2023 Overdose Review Commission Report found 60.5% of overdose deaths occurred in New Castle County, 21.1% in Kent County, and 18.4% in Sussex County.
Although awards to new applicants are on hold, the commission has begun the distribution process for $15 million worth of bridge funding to previously qualified awardees after concerns about receiving the funds were raised last month.
The State Auditor's Office is in the process of auditing 12 settlement grant recipients — it is currently unknown when the audits will be released.
Drew Fennell is a member of Delaware Public Media's Board of Directors.
