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NH congressional delegation supports federal drug policy office

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U.S. Sens. Jeanne Shaheen, D-NH, and Maggie Hassan, D-NH, have filed a measure in Congress to protect funding for the federal agency that coordinates policy to combat the opioid epidemic.

The agency is called the Office of National Drug Control Policy. It was created in 1989 by then President George H.W. Bush and is run out of the White House. President Donald Trump proposes to all but defund the office as part of his administration’s budget proposal. A check of the drug policy office’s web site shows no content other than a message that says, “Check back soon for more information.”

Legislation introduced by the Granite State’s senators would reauthorize the agency, increase funding for successful programs, and streamline the office to ensure efficient use of resources.

According to the senators, and others who favor keeping the agency, it helps coordinate policy across the federal government and administers grant funding – including the Drug Free Communities and High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area programs – that they say is critical to efforts to combat the heroin, fentanyl, and opioid crisis in New Hampshire and elsewhere.

New Hampshire’s U.S. representatives, Carol Shea-Porter, D-1st Congressional District, and Ann McClane Kuster, 2nd-DC, joined 72 other Democrat and Republican members of Congress in writing a letter asking the Trump administration maintain the ONDCP.

The White House proposes to reduce the drug policy office budget by about 95 percent, to $24 million from $388 million as a step in streamlining government spending. According to the administration, the president’s efforts to combat the opioid epidemic will be addressed in his 2018 budget request and that federal programs already exist to fight the war on drugs. The administration envisions a streamlined agency that will coordinate drug policy similar to how the National Economic Council coordinates economic policy.

Do you support efforts to maintain current funding of the Office of National Drug Control Policy? Share your opinions in the comments below.

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