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Citizens of Union County battling substance abuse or addiction will be eligible to surrender small amounts of narcotics without being arrested and gain access to recovery services free of charge under a new initiative being launched today by the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders, Prevention Links, and the County Sheriff\u2019s Office, Police Department, and Prosecutor\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n
The Community Law Enforcement Addiction Recovery (C.L.E.A.R.) program will be available to members of the public from 8 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays at the Union County Sheriff\u2019s Office, basement level of 27 Elizabethtown Plaza in Elizabeth, and at Union County Police Department headquarters, 300 North Avenue East in Westfield.<\/p>\n
Those seeking to participate in the program will be screened for eligibility by members of law enforcement and permitted to surrender illegal drugs and paraphernalia for personal use without fear of arrest, prosecution, or questioning. Those excluded from participation will include citizens with active warrants or those previously convicted of certain serious indictable offenses.<\/p>\n
Participants will be connected with Prevention Links-trained certified recovery specialists, who will serve as personal guides and mentors for those seeking to overcome their addiction.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is an essential component of our mission to provide support to individuals and family members seeking assistance accessing treatment and recovery services,\u201d said Pamela Capaci, CEO of Prevention Links.<\/p>\n
The initiative is based on a model first established by the Gloucester Police Department in Massachusetts and later adopted by the Sussex County Prosecutor\u2019s Office and Newton Police Department. The County Freeholder Board authorized $17,000 in funding for the program and an additional $150,000 this year for inpatient addiction treatment beds.<\/p>\n
The model can also be adopted by individual municipal police departments.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is an urgent need to get more of those who suffer from opioid addiction to help, and Operation C.L.E.A.R. is certainly a step in the right direction,\u201d Freeholder Chairman Bruce H. Bergen said.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor far too long, law enforcement has approached this issue from one angle only, seeking to go after and arrest those who sell, buy, and use drugs,\u201d Union County Sheriff Joseph P. Cryan said. \u201cConsidering the scope and depth of the heroin and opioid abuse epidemic as it exists today, both here in Union County and nationwide, it\u2019s beyond obvious that we need to fundamentally change that attitude. We want those affected by this to be able to look to us for help.\u201d<\/p>\n
At least 89 people died from fatal drug overdoses in Union County last year, more than any year since the start of the decade. Police departments in Union County began deploying the lifesaving overdose-reversal drug naloxone in July 2014, with more than 300 total deployments recorded to date.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn addition to co-sponsoring the new C.L.E.A.R. program and launching our naloxone program nearly three years ago, we also strongly support the Project Medicine Drop initiative, through which citizens can safely dispose of unwanted or excess prescription medication that might otherwise fall into the wrong hands,\u201d acting Union County Prosecutor Grace H. Park added, noting that the number of Drop boxes available countywide has grown from two in 2013 to 12 today. \u201cWe are also strong proponents of our Drug Court program, through which nonviolent offenders can gain access to the recovery services they need, and we are proud members of the Union County Opioid Response Initiative, through which recipients of police-administered naloxone are connected with addiction recovery specialists at our local hospitals.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are doing everything in our power to address this pressing public safety issue in every way we can.\u201d<\/p>\n
For information, please call\u00a01-855-825-3275<\/a>\u00a0or visit\u00a0www.ucnj.org\/clear<\/a>.<\/p>\n Citizens of Union County battling substance abuse or addiction will be eligible to surrender small amounts of narcotics without being arrested and gain access to recovery services free of charge under a new initiative being launched today by the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders, Prevention Links, and the County Sheriff\u2019s Office, Police Department, and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-840","post","type-post","status-publish","format-aside","hentry","category-main","post_format-post-format-aside"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"1970-01-01 00:00:00","action":"","terms":[],"taxonomy":"","browser_timezone_offset":0},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/sheriff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/sheriff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/sheriff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/sheriff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/sheriff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=840"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/sheriff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/sheriff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/sheriff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/sheriff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/ucnj.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/4-logos-for-CLEAR.png\"){kind=spacer}
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