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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FACES & VOICES OF RECOVERY ANNOUNCES ITS
2023-2025 FEDERAL POLICY & ADVOCACY PRIORITIES
Washington, DC
Faces & Voices of Recovery is honored to continue its work through advocacy and public policy to increase accessibility and remove barriers to recovery support services.
Faces & Voices of Recovery advocates daily for the millions of people in and seeking recovery. For over 20 years they have continued to have important conversations; work with constituents to create equitable services, and create brave spaces for people
impacted by addiction, their friends, family members, and the organizations that work
to support them.
As the new Congressional term has begun, Faces & Voices of Recovery look to the future and building new relationships with decision-makers to prioritize the faces and voices of those in recovery, those using substances, and their families. The 2023-2025 plan highlights the need to expand addiction recovery services and accessibility, remove barriers and nurture social determinants of recovery, and harness the passion and action for
grassroots engagement.
A few priority highlights from the plan include strengthening patient health information safeguards that prevent unauthorized disclosure, diversify funding streams for recovery support services across federal and state agencies, ensure laws and regulation reflect harm reduction principles, and expand Recovery-Ready Workplace (RRW) models including eliminating arbitrary penalties for past criminal convictions.
For more information on Faces & Voices of Recovery please visit http://www.facesandvoicesofrecovery.org.
Emily Porcelli
Marketing and Communications Manager
Faces & Voices of Recovery
(202) 741-9392
eporcelli@facesandvoicesofrecovery.org
“Unlocking the Potential of Recovery Community Organizations and Peer Recovery Support Services is an important call to action on the future of addiction recovery in the United States”, says William L. White, Recovery Historian, and author of Slaying the Dragon: The History of Addiction Treatment and Recovery in America. “If its recommendations are heeded, this seminal report could well be a milestone in the future of recovery community organizations and peer recovery support services.”
The white paper, soon to be released publicly by Faces & Voices of Recovery, demonstrates how the current financing models for peer recovery support services present significant barriers to maximizing the role of the peer workforce in addressing the addiction crisis in the United States. The peer-to-peer relationship impacts health at multiple levels of the socioecological model (i.e., at individual, family, community, and societal levels) and has potential not currently actualized. The inclusion of peer workers has become a best practice and a number of interventions utilizing them demonstrate compelling outcomes. In this report, the authors lay out the key issues underlying the need for action to bring about broad systems change.
“While we recognize the complexity of policy and financing issues, the peer workforce and recovery community organizations that employ them need a paradigm shift now to sustain their invaluable work in communities across America. This report is a must-read for everyone interested in the future of recovery community organizations and peer recovery support services”, says Patty McCarthy, CEO of Faces & Voices of Recovery.
Authors of the white paper are Kenneth D. Smith, PhD, Assistant Professor of Public Health at the University of Tennessee Knoxville, Robin Peyson, MHSA, Owner & Lead Consultant of RLP Consulting, and Sierra Castedo de Martell, MPH, Doctoral Candidate, UTHealth School of Public Health, Austin Regional Campus.
Join Faces & Voices of Recovery at 3-4:30 pm ET on December 1, 2022, for a webinar with the authors, as well as other nationally recognized leaders in the recovery movement. To learn more or register https://facesandvoicesofrecovery.org/event/a-seat-at-the-table-leadership-to-unlock-the-potential-of-recovery-community/
Unlocking the Potential of Recovery Community Organizations and Peer Recovery Support Services will be made available on the Faces & Voices of Recovery website at https://facesandvoicesofrecovery.org/ prior to the event.
Contact
Washington, DC
Faces & Voices of Recovery, a national advocacy organization and staple in the recovery community since 2001, is proud to further the work and dedication of International Recovery Day (IRD). Assuming responsibility of International Recovery Day – formerly International Recovery Day, Inc. – and all its assets, Faces & Voices will now lead and manage the continuation of this incredible event and its movement into the future.
In 2019, John Winslow founded International Recovery Day, Inc. as an organization and event dedicated to promoting all recovery pathways from substance use disorders and educating the public on the value of recovery. Celebrated the 30th of September (Recovery Month), International Recovery Day is an opportunity to celebrate recovery with countries from across the globe! Although International Recovery Day, Inc. will no longer operate, the annual celebration remains. Entering its third year, Faces & Voices will continue this international celebration by working with organizations, entities, and enthusiastic supporters of recovery to illuminate monuments and structures in purple across the world on September 30th.
Founder, and former owner of International Recovery Day, John Winslow, shares his excitement for this transition, “From its earliest inception, I have pondered how best to ensure the continuity and growth of International Recovery Day… I felt an increasing recognition of the need to find and establish a solid home base for this new and tender venture that held the potential to impact millions. I feel confident this transition will ensure continuity of our annual global event and expand addiction recovery awareness and involvement to a much larger scale. It just feels right.” IRD blends seamlessly into Faces & Voices core service – advocacy. Continuing the tradition of International Recovery Day embraces Faces & Voices mission to change the way addiction and recovery are understood and embraced through advocacy, education, and leadership.
Faces & Voices is ecstatic for this opportunity to heighten international awareness for recovery. “International Recovery Day has demonstrated that the global recovery movement has incredible power and provides a vital connection for millions around the world. We’re sincerely grateful for John Winslow’s leadership and vision for IRD. We’re honored to coordinate the annual observance and raise awareness for all recovery pathways from all addictions. We aim to engage individuals in every country around the world as a way to honor those in recovery and provide hope for those still struggling with addiction”, says Patty McCarthy, Chief Executive Officer, Faces & Voices of Recovery.
International Recovery Day demonstrates the immense impact addiction recovery has on the world around us. From Niagara Falls in New York to Google Headquarters in California, and landmarks across the world lit purple on a single day to acknowledge recovery shows the tremendous affect that substance use disorder and recovery has on communities.
International Recovery Day’s website – internationrecoveryday.org also provides space for people across the world to launch virtual fireworks on September 30th, to symbolize the hope and help that is offered through different recovery pathways and allow people to celebrate their own recovery – in a way that’s unique to them – and yet still a small part of a greater whole.
Advancing IRD’s accelerated progress requires a revitalized sense of community from person-to-person gatherings or screen-to-screen hangouts, “around the world, the recovery movement is gaining traction and depth. We are thrilled to continue International Recovery Day and support equitable access to recovery for any human being who wants it. At Faces & Voices, we envision a global recovery movement that knows no bounds, borders, or barriers”, says Phil Rutherford, Chief Operating Officer, Faces & Voices of Recovery.
Whether anyone or any group participate launching virtual fireworks or illuminating landmarks and buildings purple, International Recovery Day reminds us that “Recovery is for Everyone” and engaging and celebrating recovery extends well beyond a single person.
Thank you for supporting us in our efforts and advocacy for a brighter future for all.
For more information, visit internationalrecoveryday.org and www.facesandvoicesofrecovery.org
Emily Porcelli, Marketing and Communications
Faces & Voices of Recovery
202-741-9392
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A Historical Summit
by: Bill White
In 2001, more than 130 recovery advocates from more than 30 states gathered in Saint Paul, Minnesota at the invitation of the Johnson Institute’s Alliance Project and with support of the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment’s (CSAT) Recovery Community Support Program (RCSP). That gathering marked the formal launch of a new recovery advocacy movement in the United States. The vision of culturally and politically mobilizing people in recovery and their families and allies was not a new vison, but those of us in St. Paul during those momentous days had an unmistakable feeling that we were participating in something that could reshape the future of addiction recovery. Now, with 20 years of hindsight, we can acknowledge what was so significant about this event.
The 2001 Recovery Summit marked a clarion call to shift the center of the alcohol and other drug problems arena to a focus on the lived solution for individuals, families, and communities. The shift from pathology/clinical paradigms to a “recovery paradigm” exerted pressure for urgent changes in policy, research, treatment, recovery support practice, and service system evaluation. The emergence or elevation of such concepts as recovery management, recovery-oriented systems of care, recovery coaching, recovery support services, recovery capital, recovery cascade (contagion), culture of recovery, community recovery, etc. would be missing from our current landscape without this paradigm shift, as would many recovery-focused research studies.
The 2001 Recovery Summit marked the passing of the recovery advocacy leadership torch from an earlier generation of advocacy organizations, most notably the National Committee for Education on Alcoholism (1944, later the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence) and the Society of Americans for Recovery (1991). The founding of Faces and Voices of Recovery as an outcome of the Summit set the stage for subsequent efforts, including Young People in Recovery, Facing Addiction, Shatterproof, the Recovery Advocacy Project, Latino Recovery Advocacy, Black Faces Black Voices, the African American Federation of Recovery Organizations, and other national recovery advocacy efforts. Faces and Voices provided the connecting tissue for RCO leaders to gather, communicate, share resources, and speak with a collective voice. The 2001 Recovery Summit set the foundation for the landmark accomplishments of Faces and Voices of Recovery and other recovery advocacy organizations.
The 2001 Recovery Summit marked the coming of age of a new organizational entity—the grassroots recovery community organization (RCO). The emerging RCO was not a recovery mutual aid fellowship, an alcohol/drug problems council, or a prevention or treatment organization, but rather an organization focused exclusively on recovery community mobilization, recovery advocacy, and recovery-focused community development. Subsequently linked through the Association of Recovery Community Organizations, RCOs have been instrumental in supporting further recovery community institution building, e.g., recovery community centers; recovery residences; occupational/workplace recovery programs; recovery high schools and collegiate recovery programs; recovery ministries; recovery-focused health, sports, and adventure programs; and recovery-focused projects in music, theatre, art, and community service.
The 2001 Recovery Summit marked a milestone in multicultural and multiple pathway recovery advocacy. The 2001 Summit was diverse in its representation of women, communities of color, and the LGBTQ community as well as its representation of diverse pathways of addiction recovery. The Summit was historically noteworthy in bringing affected family members into the advocacy movement on an equal footing with those with lived experience of addiction recovery. The Summit marked a milestone: people representing diverse pathways and styles of recovery seeing themselves collectively as “a people” with shared needs and aspirations. That “peoplehood” inspired subsequent calls for authentic and diverse recovery representation at all levels of decision-making within the AOD problems arena.
The 2001 Recovery Summit marked an early vision—the seed—of the integration of primary prevention, harm reduction, early intervention, treatment, and peer recovery support—a process that continues to this day through efforts to delineate roles and responsibilities as well as efforts of coordination and collaboration across this service and support continuum. Prior to the 2001 Recovery Summit, recovery never appeared on the alcohol and other drug service continuum. The emergence of peer recovery support services as a distinct service entity following the Summit constitutes a significant historical milestone.
What the 2001 Recovery Summit did more than anything was weld the personal commitments of individuals and programs into a national recovery advocacy movement. We had a name; a consensus on vision, goals, and tactics; and, most importantly, we had mutually supportive relationships across the country that bound us together in common cause. I look forward to our gathering this October to revision the future of recovery advocacy in the United States.
An Invitation to Return to Saint Paul
by: Philip Rutherford
Even before my arrival at Faces & Voices, I learned about the rich history and significance of the St. Paul summit that happened on October 5, 2001. While working at a Minnesota RCO, I attended an event put on by The Association of Recovery Community Organizations (ARCO) that was modeled after the original summit. At the time, it was called the ARCO Executive Directors Leadership Academy, and it transformed both my personal understanding of the recovery movement, and ultimately the trajectory of my organization. ARCO’s roots are connected to the powerful movement that arose from the St. Paul summit and that continue to propel the work of countless organizations today.
On October 3, 2021, at the River Centre in St. Paul, Minnesota, we will convene another summit to commemorate the passing of the 20th anniversary of that event. We will examine where we are today and look toward the future. The event will have plenary speakers like Bill White, Dr. Nora Volkow, William Moyers Jr. and Dr. Delphin-Rittmon, and will include six different tracks of learning concentrations around Advocacy, Peer Recovery Support Services, Capacity Building, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, Family and Youth, and Leadership Development.
Many things have changed about the recovery movement since 2001. At Faces & Voices, we see this event as an opportunity to celebrate the tireless efforts of those who have come before us, honor those in the trenches right now, and help clear a path for anyone who wants to join the journey. Similarly, some things haven’t changed, and we see this event as an opportunity to have frank and open discussions about where change is required.
If 2020 has taught me anything, it is to expect the unexpected, and as such, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention COVID-19 and the possibility of rates of infection affecting our plans. The COVID-19 Delta and Lambda variants are influencing how the celebration will take place. We are closely monitoring guidelines and restrictions and will make decisions as the situation unfolds.
Unless restrictions prohibit us from gathering, we plan on hosting the conference in-person. We understand some people may be hesitant to attend, due to safety concerns.
If necessary, we will deliver a webinar-based, hybrid option to accommodate more people, so that we can still be together as a community for this important milestone. We will update you as we can. In addition, the River Centre has taken a number of precautions to ensure your safety.
Thank you for your patience and understanding during this time.
To make it a bit clearer, here are three possible scenarios as examples:
Scenario A– All is well. No mandates or city-wide orders in place regarding COVID
*Summit takes place as scheduled. Proof of Vaccine/Negative test results/mask required (with audit during event). We will stream only keynote events.
Scenario B– Positivity rates increase, moderate concern surrounding transmission. No mandates or city-wide orders in place regarding COVID.
*Summit takes place as scheduled. Proof of Vaccine/Negative test results/mask required (with audit during event). Social distancing rules will be enforced, hybrid conference occurs with streaming of each session.
Scenario C-All is not well, mandates or city-wide orders are in place regarding COVID
Summit takes place entirely in virtual space.
Gate: September 1 decision date
Nationwide positivity of >12% Scenario C
Nationwide positivity of 5-12% Scenario B
Nationwide positivity of <5% Scenario A
Regardless of the eventual format, we extend a warm invitation for you to participate. You can register by clicking HERE. Let’s go make some more history.
UPDATE: On September 1, 2021 Faces & Voices of Recovery made the difficult decision to move the event to a completely virtual setting.
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Faces & Voices of Recovery would like to acknowledge that, On January 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing all enslaved people. Nearly two and a half years later, on June 19, 1865, the enslaved residing in Texas received news of their freedom. Juneteenth marks the day when federal troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, to take control of the state and ensure that all enslaved people be freed. On June 17, 2021 President Joseph Biden signed a law making Juneteenth an official federal holiday. Faces & Voices of Recovery recognizes Juneteenth as a national holiday, and we honor it as the day all slaves in America became free.
On this important day, we are proud to release the following document regarding Race Equity. It is the culmination of a year-long examination and thoughtful reflection on our collective role in the recovery community’s pathway toward race equity. We are grateful to our partners in this endeavor for their painstaking work. We also extend an open invitation to any organization who would like to join us in this work.
We believe there is ample opportunity to heal.
The work continues.
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