Sunday, May 11, 2025
5/11/2025
Rural Communities Opioid Response Program-Overdose Response - The Ute Mountain Ute are a federally recognized Tribe living on the 889.1 square miles of the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe Reservation in the Four Corners Region of America’s Southwest, spanning across Montezuma County (Towaoc), Colorado and San Juan County (White Mesa), Utah – a community entirely eligible in the Rural Health Grants Analyzer. The Ute Mountain Ute Tribe has long faced the devastating impact of SUD and OUD, an epidemic that impacts youth, families, adults, and the elderly alike. Committed to supporting proactive efforts to build a better life, UMUT opened a new behavioral health building, Mógúán, in late 2019, offering culturally appropriate services to confront long-held stigmas that surround substance abuse in this isolated community. With a one-time infusion of dollars, UMUT’s Mógúán (“my heart” in the Ute dialect) will be prepared with additional certified Peer Recovery Coaches, additional treatment space, and a new telehealth mobile crisis intervention unit that can bring evidence-based SUD/OUD treatment services to all corners of the rural, remote UMUT reservation. Overall Goal: Expand SUD/OUD treatment accessibility on the remote UMUT reservation, leveraging trainings and infrastructure improvements to achieve full program sustainability beyond the 12-month funding period. Together, the UMUT Consortium of Mógúán, Growing Healthy Ute Drug Free Coalition, Tribal Courts, and Health Services Departments will undertake four eligible activities: Activity #2: Establishing, improving, or expanding physical SUD/OUD care delivery sites. - The Ute Mountain Ute Tribe’s behavioral health facility, Mógúán, currently offers a patient care room that is 20 feet long and 12 feet wide. This large space is ideally suited to being divided into two separate, smaller rooms that could dramatically increase the number of individuals connected to SUD/OUD services each day. This room will be soundproofed and divided, creating two patient care rooms. Both will be equipped with furniture, including a couch, a desk, and two chairs., and wired for telemedicine with a digital hotspot to overcome connection challenges on the reservation, and necessary technology such as a laptop, monitor, and lighting. Activity #3: Offering certification, formalized training programs, and/or professional mentorship opportunities to enhance providers’ ability to care for individuals with SUD/OUD. - UMUT was recently able to hire two Peer Specialists to work with those seeking SUD/OUD treatment. With funding, these individuals will complete Peer Recovery Coach certification, sustainably increasing their skills and competencies in their field. Activity #5: Training peer recovery support specialists and coordinating placements in local SUD/OUD service delivery sites. - Peer Specialists will be trained as certified Peer Recovery Coaches, and will continue to serve the community at Mógúán. Additionally, Peer Recovery Coaches will travel with the new mobile crisis services unit, enhancing telehealth with in-person support options. - UMUT will offer new trainings to the Crisis Response Team to prepare them to offer targeted support and “warm handoff” referrals to individuals and families immediately following overdose. Activity #7: Improving capacity for and access to telehealth treatment services for SUD/OUD. - UMUT will create two patient care rooms at Mógúán fully equipped for telehealth delivery. - UMUT will purchase a mobile crisis telehealth unit that will travel throughout the UMUT reservation, reaching individuals throughout the Towaoc community four days a week and the White Mesa community nearly two hours away once each week.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).