Tuesday Afternoon Wire

“Hands Off!” Protest at Tracy Park Draws Crowd Despite Rain
PORTSMOUTH — April 5

Approximately 200 Scioto Countians braved the rain this past Saturday to gather in Portsmouth’s Tracy Park as part of a nationwide “Hands Off!” protest against the Trump Administration’s spate of recent policy decisions.

Holding aloft dripping signs as motorists honked in support, protesters stretched along the entire eastern block of Tracy Park.

“I’m here because Donald Trump has spent nearly a decade trying to divide the American people. And guess what? America is not divisible,” said Landen Pucket, speaking into a megaphone. “We need to protect Medicaid, Medicare, our libraries, LGBTQ individuals, and women’s rights.”

Reverend Gary L. Hopkins, pastor of Valley United Methodist Church, echoed those concerns. “This is a real trial our country is going through,” Hopkins said. “Think about eliminating Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security. What does common sense alone say we should do?”

Though the event had sparked heated debate and warnings of potential counter-protests, none materialized.

Commissioners Discuss Recovery Housing

Responding to questions regarding recovery housing, Commissioners discussed recovery housing in Scioto and surrounding counties.

Commissioner Scottie Powell said that because Scioto County was where the opioid epidemic began, the regional treatment and recovery sector developed in response to the crisis. As facilities and organizations grew, they began to reach out to counties around the state and region to send individuals to Scioto County for recovery services.

“You didn’t see the treatment infrastructure grow around the state in any kind of meaningful way.”

Commissioner Bryan Davis also weighed in.

“They found that to get people clean, you also have to give them a bridge out to society,” Davis said. “What I have seen is a major proliferation and increase in spending in this state at the federal level on this issue.”

Davis said the opioid epidemic started as an Appalachia problem and then evolved to be a national one, explaining that oversight of recovery housing was slow to arrive as facilities expanded.

“That just started in the last couple legislatures.”

Davis said other counties ship their problems to Scioto County, referring to individuals remanded by courts to treatment. Davis said the problem was ultimately “Big Money.”

“We have gone from where Big Pharma was the one making all the money, to where Big Pharma is still making all the money because they make the drugs to treat it,” Davis said. “And now people are addicted to those drugs.”

Davis argued it was wrong that more public funds go to recovery services than to care for veterans or the elderly.

“When the state of Ohio spends more on someone in recovery than they do grandma or grandpa in the nursing home, that is fundamentally immoral, unethical, and flat out wrong,” Davis said. “And you can even take that over to our veterans.”

However, budget data from the state and federal level paints a more complex picture.

In Ohio’s Fiscal Years 2024–2025 biennial budget, the state allocated approximately $2.3 billion to the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, supporting a broad range of recovery-related programs including prevention, treatment, and support services for substance use and mental health disorders (Center for Community Solutions). By comparison, funding dedicated specifically to elder care is significantly higher when considering both nursing home and in-home services. The state set aside $1.4 billion for nursing homes alone, and the Ohio Department of Aging requested an additional $279.5 million over the two years to support home- and community-based services that allow seniors to age in place (Statehouse News Bureau, Community Solutions). Together, these allocations show that while Ohio has significantly increased investment in recovery, elder care remains the larger spending priority in the state budget.

While Ohio allocates more state funding to recovery efforts than to veterans’ services—about $2.3 billion for mental health and addiction over the biennium compared to roughly $295 million for the Department of Veterans Services—federal spending alters the picture. In 2022, Ohio received $97 million in federal opioid response grants to bolster its recovery infrastructure . However, federal support for veterans far exceeds that, with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs spending approximately $302 billion nationwide in 2023 . Though specific federal allocations to Ohio veterans are not broken out, the scale of national spending suggests that when combined with state dollars, overall funding for veterans likely surpasses that for recovery programs in the state.