Ripples of HOPE: Positive Interventions for Richmond County's Youngest Victims of the Opioid Crisis

OVC’s mission is to enhance the nation’s capacity to assist crime victims and provide leadership in changing policies and practices to promote justice and healing for all victims of crime. OVC achieves this mission, in part, by administering discretionary award programs supported by the federal Crime Victims Fund to develop innovative training and technical assistance, and to provide direct services to improve the overall quality of victim assistance. The purpose of this solicitation is to address an urgent gap in crime victim services related to America’s Drug Crisis to support direct services to children and youth who are crime victims as a result of the nation’s addiction crisis. This award made to Richmond County District Attorney is funded under OVC FY2020 Enhancing Community Responses to America’s Addiction Crisis: Serving Our Youngest Crime Victims. The Richmond County District Attorney’s Office (RCDA) in partnership with the YMCA Counseling Service proposes to connect Staten Island’s youngest crime victims associated with parental overdose be linked with supportive community-based health services. The proposed project, Ripples of HOPE will be an expansion of RCDA’s successful Heroin Overdose and Preventative Education program HOPE, an unprecedented collaboration among law enforcement, City and State Health agencies, and community providers effectively responding to the substance use epidemic impacting Staten Island. RCDA along with NYPD implemented the Overdose Response Initiative (ORI) which investigates all reported overdoses on Staten Island. ORI attends the scene of an overdose to gather investigatory evidence and to offer supportive services to grieving families. Through the ORI initiative RCDA maintains real time data on overdose fatalities and naloxone saves. CA/NCF