The Board of Education Police Department has been awarded a grant from the Georgia Criminal Justice Coordinating Council for a project under the Opioid Affected Youth Initiative. B.O.E.P.D. Campus Police had one of eleven projects to be awarded part of $500,000 slated for the initiative. The proposal that was awarded the grant will provide Narcan and training to all officers and nurses in the district. Some training is being provided to the department for free through a partnership with For Life Medical Education Services – a local company that is providing not only the training, but all training materials for free. That will allow all the grant dollars to be used towards life-saving equipment.
In 2018, CJCC was one of six initial governmental organizations awarded the Opioid Affected Youth Initiative (OAYI) grant from the Department of Justice's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice (OJJDP). This initiative focuses on improving Georgia's opioid response for youth who come into contact with the juvenile justice system by funding new programming designed to respond to the growing number of youth who are opioid involved or opioid affected. A request for proposals (RFP) was released in early June (and re-released in August) for applicants to implement evidence-based programs addressing the opioid epidemic with a focus on Georgia's youth.
In addition to the Savannah-Chatham Board of Education Police Department, funding recipients include: the Bulloch County Alcohol and Drug Abuse Council, Communities in Schools of Burke County Family Connections, the Council on Alcohol and Drugs, the Davis Direction Foundation, the Georgia Council on Substance Abuse, the Stephens County Board of Education, and Unison Behavioral Health.
