Advisory

 SAMHSA Awards $24.9 Million for Substance Abuse Treatment and HIV/AIDS Services for Minorities

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) today announced the award of 10 grants totaling $24.9 million over five years to enhance and expand substance abuse treatment, outreach, and pretreatment services in conjunction with HIV/AIDS services in Black, Latino/Hispanic, and other racial or ethnic communities highly affected by the twin epidemics of substance abuse and HIV/AIDS. Beverly Watts Davis, Senior Advisor on Substance Abuse Policy at SAMHSA, also announced the grants during her speech at the 2006 United States Conference on AIDS held in Hollywood, Florida.  

“The interrelationships among substance use and HIV/AIDS is indisputable, and it continues to be a growing concern among racial and ethnic minority communities,” said Assistant Surgeon General Eric Broderick, D.D.S., M.P.H., SAMHSA’s Acting Deputy Administrator.  “These new grantees are tied to grassroots organizations that are deeply rooted in the culture of the community and have a proven track record of reaching and serving people in need of substance abuse treatment and HIV/AIDS services.”

The ten awards are each funded up to $500,000 per year in total costs and are being administered by SAMHSA’s Center for Substance Abuse Treatment.  In addition to substance abuse treatment, services offered by grantees include brief interventions, including providing literature and other materials to support behavior change, facilitating access to drug treatment, HIV/AIDS testing and counseling services, and other medical and social services available in the local community

Continuation of these awards is subject to the availability of funds as well as the progress achieved by the grantees. Total funding for year one is $5.0 million.

The Targeted Capacity Expansion Substance Abuse Treatment and HIV/AIDS Services grantees are as follows:

Alabama

Health Services Center, Inc., Anniston- $500,000 for one year and approximately $250,000 per year for the following four years to expand the Behavioral Day Treatment program to provide transportation and outpatient substance abuse treatment for Black women who are HIV infected or at risk for HIV infection in rural Alabama. 

Arizona

Arizona Board of Regents/University of Arizona, Tucson -- $500,000 per year to implement Project DAP (Determining Another Path).  This project will expand and enhance services for Hispanic, Black, and Native American adolescents in partnership with the Arizona Children’s Association substance abuse treatment program.

Cope Behavioral Services, Inc., Tucson-- $495,623 per year to provide intensive outpatient substance abuse treatment to Latina women who have been released from the prison system within the past two years.  Treatment will be evidence-based using the Cognitive-Behavioral Approach: Treating Cocaine Addiction Manual developed by HHS’s National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA).

Massachusetts

Tapestry Health, Inc., Florence-- $500,000 per year to expand HIV prevention and substance abuse treatment services for Latino injection drug users.  A mobile van service will provide rapid HIV testing as well as screening for STDs and hepatitis and nurse practitioner primary health care.

New York

Osborne Association, Long Island-- $497,280 per year to provide intensive outpatient substance abuse treatment services and enhanced pretreatment and HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment services among individuals in the Bronx who have been involved in the criminal justice system.

Center for Community Alternatives, Syracuse -- $500,000 per year to expand its current six-month, women’s -only program to include new treatment slots for Black men recently released from the New York criminal justice system.  In addition to substance abuse treatment, the men will receive on-site HIV rapid testing, Hepatitis C (liver disease) and STD screens, drug use evaluations, medical assessments, psychiatric evaluations, treatment plans and case management.

Heritage Health and Housing Inc., New York City-- $500,000 per year to add 150 northern Manhattan treatment slots, which will be accessed through mobile outreach, pre-treatment and integrated services for alcohol and drug-involved Black and Latina women released from state and local jails and prisons. 

St. Luke’s – Roosevelt Institute for Health Sciences, New York City -- $499,999 per year to provide Motivational Enhancement Therapy and Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy to HIV-positive and HIV high-risk minority adolescents with substance abuse problems.

Long Island Associate for AIDS Care, Hauppauge-- $500,000 to provide culturally competent mobile outreach and transportation for up to 7,000 adults in the area.  The outreach van will provide prevention messages, literature and physical prevention tools; rapid HIV testing with pre- and post- counseling; hepatitis screening; referrals to primary health care, mental health services, social services and legal services.

Washington

Neighborhood House, Seattle -- $500,000 per year to implement the NIDA Community-based Outreach Model to produce an integrated and comprehensive HIV/substance abuse services continuum that will link HIV outreach and education services with substance abuse treatment.

SAMHSA, is a public health agency within the Department of Health and Human Services. The agency is responsible for improving the accountability, capacity and effectiveness of the nation’s substance abuse prevention, addictions, treatment, and mental health services delivery system.

SAMHSA is An Agency of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Service