HERMANN — Gasconade County government will contract with the regional planning agency to administer the county’s opioid settlement funds, which now total about $70,000 with more payments coming in over the next decade.

The County Commission Thursday morning agreed to contract with Meramec Regional Planning Commission (MRPC) to administer the program, much like it did with the county’s CARES Act money and is doing with the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding.

Officials of the eight counties within the Meramec Region on Jan. 31 received a detailed proposal from MRPC extending that agency’s services for handling the funds coming in from a class-action lawsuit settlement with manufacturers and distributors of opioid drugs. The settlement calls for payments to be made to local governments for possibly the next 15 years.

For the past year, Prosecuting Attorney Mary E. Weston headed the county’s efforts to plan for the use of about $70,000 received so far by Gasconade County. Weston assembled the Opioid Settlement Team about mid-year to begin discussing ways to use the money to combat opioid addiction, which is ranked high in Gasconade County.

After being asked by one treatment provider for a share of the money, county administrators said they wanted to know more about the plans being developed. They asked for a meeting with Weston at the beginning of this year; at that time, the prosecuting attorney turned over the program to the Commission.

Presiding Commissioner Tim Schulte, R-Hermann, Thursday morning said has talked with Shari Huxal of the 20th Circuit’s Drug Treatment Court, based in Osage County, for input on ways to use the settlement money. The foundation for deciding how to use the money will be laid by MRPC. Using the plan crafted by Phelps County as a model, the planning agency will help set up a local committee of interested organizations and help panel officers.

“We can plan, organize and convene meetings, helping to develop meeting agenda, post public meetings, take meeting minutes, etc,” said MRPC Executive Director Bonnie Prigge in a letter to officials throughout the Meramec Region. “We could help your committee identify what resources are already in place, identify what the opioid-related needs are in your county and identify that gap, and prioritize those needs, which would help guide your committee in making funding decisions. We could help you develop a grant application to use to gather project requests and can help establish evaluation criteria.”

This work can be funded through grant money at no cost to the county, Prigge noted.

Southern District Associate Commissioner Jerry Lairmore, R-Owensville, pointed out that final decisions on using the money would be in the hands of local officials.

“It would still be the county controlling the money,” he said. “They (MRPC) would just administer the money,” he added.

Indeed, the counties within the region lean heavily on the planning agency, possibly the most active regional planning commission among the 17 throughout the state of Missouri.

At the meeting last year of the Opioid Settlement Team, Weston said her plan was to use the funds to bolster the programs already in place in the county to combat addiction. She also said she would like to see the funds used for an education-and-awareness campaign, aimed in large part at high school students through the involvement of school officials.

Sheriff Scott Eiler Thursday morning said he agrees with schools taking a larger role in emphasizing the danger of addiction through use of prescription medicine, as well as using visual displays to warn of the dangers of addiction. However, he noted, “I’m in no hurry to spend any money until we know exactly where we can spend it.”

That would be part of the function of MRPC’s involvement in the early stages of the program.

While the initial involvement of the planning agency would be covered by grant money, work done for counties such as vetting applications for funding to make sure the applicants are eligible and developing a process for grant reimbursement and tracking the use of the money would be performed on a fee basis, just as the work was done regarding CARES Act and ARPA funding. The good news for Gasconade County is that paying for this service would not impact the county’s General Revenue Fund.

“The cost of this work would be an eligible cost under the administration portion of your settlement funds,” Prigge noted.

The Commission unanimously agreed to contract with MRPC on this project.