Mariposa Community Health Center, Inc.

Santa Cruz County Overcoming Addiction (SOSA) is a cross-sector consortium that convened in 2019 with the goal of collaborating to increase the availability of, and access to, culturally and linguistically appropriate services to prevent, treat and recover from substance use disorder (SUD) and especially opioid use disorder (OUD). SOSA currently has 15 members representing primary care, emergency care, behavioral health, emergency medical services, law enforcement, k-12 schools, higher education, and workforce development. Mariposa Community Health Center (MCHC) is a Federally Qualified Health Center established in 1980 to meet the needs of the rural, low income, Hispanic/Latino population of Santa Cruz County. MCHC is the lead agency and fiscal agent for funding that supports SOSA through the HRSA Rural Communities Opioid Response Program (RCORP). MCHC is currently the applicant for a RCORP-Psychostimulant Support funding opportunity to address the prevalence and impact of methamphetamines and cocaine use in the community. Six key consortium partners from the primary care, behavioral health, and workforce development sectors are charged with leading these efforts. Santa Cruz County is the smallest county in Arizona with a population of 48,724. Almost half of county residents live in Nogales, the international port of entry. This proximity to the Mexico border means that county residents have access to Mexican pharmacies where policies and procedures differ from county and U.S. practices. It also means the county experiences heavy illegal drug trafficking. According to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s National Seizure System, among the top ten drug types seized in 2020, eight were opioids and methamphetamines- a total of 922 seizures. In 2019 and 2020, 87% of overdose cases involved opioids and 37% involved psycho stimulants (methamphetamine and cocaine). Sixty-five percent (65%) involved two or more drugs. Among cases involving psychostimulants, all but one (94%) involved two or more drugs. Santa Cruz County is a HRSA designated Health Professional Shortage Area (HPSA) and there are major gaps in services for county residents: there are no in-patient treatment facilities, homeless shelters are limited, no transitional housing programs, or domestic violence shelters. The overarching objectives for the three-year RCORP-PS project period are: 1) Expand SOSA prevention strategies and activities to address methamphetamines and cocaine, 2) Expand SOSA treatment and recovery strategies and activities to address methamphetamines and cocaine, 3) Formalize a SOSA data monitoring team to share SUD prevalence, caseloads, and overdoses in Santa Cruz County, and 4) Integrate psychostimulant use/misuse into SOSA sustainability work focused on SUD-OUD prevention, treatment and recovery.