In a surprising turn of events, the United States Senate approved the reauthorization of the SUPPORT Act in September via unanimous consent. Most advocates were unaware that such action was being prepared. The legislation had been languishing for quite some time- The House had approved the same measure several months earlier, so the legislation was sent to the White House for the President’s signature. Attempts to reauthorize the legislation in the last congress were unsuccessful, as the House favored a “clean” reauthorization (no amendments or changes) while the Senate added several amendments to their version, which never got further than the committee stage. This reauthorization is “clean,” and remains critical to policies and programs that impact and promote SUD recovery, since in the current political environment programs that are unauthorized are extremely vulnerable in the current political environment.
First passed in 2018 as a follow up to the historic Comprehensive Addiction Recovery Act (CARA), the SUPPORT act established several new programs in SUD treatment and recovery. These programs span the treatment, prevention, and recovery sectors, and are all together funded in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Included in the reauthorization are several programs of great importance to the recovery community. These include the Building Communities of Recovery (BCOR) program, the peer support technical assistance center, and the CAREER act, which assists people in recovery with finding employment and housing.
Of course, authorization is only half the equation. We remain in a situation where the funding for these critical programs remains very murky and will continue as such until the government shutdown concludes. Even then, the two chambers of Congress and the President must agree on programmatic funding levels.
At the writing of this update, the federal government remains in a shutdown, as no appropriations (spending) bills were passed by the September 30 deadline. This is the first shutdown since 2018, which lasted a record five weeks. The question most people have is, of course, how will the shutdown impact grant distribution. It is our understanding that the biggest impact is on grant awards scheduled to go out while the shutdown is in effect. State Opioid Response Grants and the SUPTR block grant are paid to states quarterly, and the most recent payments were made just before the shutdown went into effect. Medicaid and Medicare coverage remains in effect. The Trump administration has threatened to permanently lay off “thousands” of workers during the shutdown, including at the Department of Health and Human Services. To date, this has not happened, but we will remain vigilant as we monitor the situation.