Thursday, April 10, 2025
4/10/2025
Tribal/State Collaboration to enhance the delivery of recovery services to rural communities in Northern Maine - Project Abstract Summary The Penobscot Nation Tribal Healing to Wellness Court will implement the Tribal State Collaboration to Enhance the Diversity of Recovery Services in Rural Areas of Northern Maine to serve tribal nation members, their spouses/ partners, and descendants. The Project will hire a public defender to represent participants in the Tribal Court and/or the State or Federal systems using braided services incorporating legal, psychological, and sociological support. The project name is Tribal State Collaboration to Enhance the Diversity of Recovery Services in Rural Areas of Northern Maine. The population to be served includes adult American Indian or Alaskan Native tribal nation members of every gender identity, their spouses/ partners who have lived with the tribal nation members for six months or longer, and descendants of Native Americans who are not on the census who are diagnosed with a substance use disorder and charged with crimes within the jurisdiction of the Penobscot Nation Tribal Court occurring on the Nation’s reservations; within the Penobscot, Kennebec, Cumberland, and two adjacent County Districts; Superior Court; or Federal Court. The strategies include offering best practices used during the current SAMSHA grant to address the unmet needs of descendants not on the census and the spouses/partners who have lived with tribal members for six months or longer. Addressing these unmet needs will reduce the tribal member’s exposure to substances, paraphernalia, and the use of addictive substances. The strategies also include offering program participants access to culturally specific detoxification and recovery facilities in, and outside, of Maine and covering the costs not paid by insurance or Maine Care. Finally, the program includes hiring a full time public defender to represent participants charged in the Tribal Court and/or the State or Federal judicial systems to coordinate services, provide culturally specific representation, and reduce the number of felony convictions. The project will minimize pre-trial incarceration, the confinement of a participant in jail for extended periods waiting for a public defender to arrange bail or bed to bed treatment. The project goals and measurable objectives include helping seventy five members of federally recognized tribes, their spouses/partners of six months or longer, and descendants of Native Americans not on the census end intergenerational patterns of substance abuse, criminal behavior, incarceration, and related family and community breakdown, by expanding access to culturally specific care, case management, and wraparound braided services. The project will establish an interjurisdictional, multisystem model that reduces incarceration rates, reduces the stigmatization of individuals with a substance use disorder, increases access to culturally specific interventions and treatment services, and closes gaps in the continuum of substance abuse and co-occurring disorder treatment. The interventions will decrease the relapse rate for seventy five participants by offering access to culturally specific treatment facilities in Maine and surrounding states, regardless of the participants’ insurance status or the facility’s acceptance of Maine Care. Throughout the project, attention will be given toward maintaining the Penobscot Nation Tribal Healing to Wellness Court’s high operational standards as a national drug court leader. Fifteen people will be served annually and seventy-five will be served over the entire project.
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).