By Melissa Stagnaro
Special to The Evening Sun
stagnaro.melissa@gmail.com

CHENANGO COUNTY – It all started when I was injured and my doctor prescribed me opiate medication for my pain.’
That’s the story that James Everard, coordinator of Chenango County’s Drug Treatment Court, says he has been hearing from heroin addicts for the last five years.
As someone who has dedicated his career to aiding the recovery and rehabilitation of people with drug and alcohol issues, Everard has great insight into the drug problem in Chenango County.
News of a drug bust or an overdose may cause a stir when it hits the headlines, but according to Everard, the severity of the problem – and its impact on the community – is something the general public doesn’t realize.
“I think they would be shocked,” he said.
According to Everard, Chenango County started seeing an influx in heroin use around 2008. That’s when, in an effort to crack down on prescription drug abuse, New York State started holding doctors more accountable for the medication – particularly narcotic painkillers – they prescribed.
“A lot of the people who could no longer get those drugs started using heroin,” explained Chenango County District Attorney Joseph McBride, which was a cheaper option to feed their opiate addiction.
Since then, use of heroin has become the county’s biggest drug concern.
“You can find heroin in every community, big or small, in Chenango County,” Everard said.
Disturbing Trends
According to McBride, heroin use crosses all socio-economic groups, and there is no one demographic that is more susceptible or prone to use or addiction. But Everard has noticed one trend: a much younger age group are now using the highly-addictive drug, and using it intravenously.
“It’s less expensive than pills, and because (of) the purity…a young person becomes addicted very quickly,” he explained.
There are other trends both Everard and McBride have noticed. One is the influx of out-of-town drug dealers. A lack of employment opportunities in the area means that these out-of-towners have no trouble finding locals to peddle their wares.
“The new recruits get paid in heroin, enough to maintain their addiction and avoid the discomfort of withdrawal,” said Everard.
Arrests and convictions for drug possession have been on the rise, but they only tell part of the story when it comes to drug-related crime. According to McBride, 58 percent of the Chenango County’s District Attorney’s Office’s current 88 open cases are drug or alcohol related. And that doesn’t take into account the crimes that go unreported.
“Stealing from family members is usually the first crime an addicted person commits,” said Everard. “This can go on for a long time. The impact on a family unit is devastating.”
There is also the public health risk that heroin presents.
“There has been a dramatic increase in hepatitis cases and other types of infections that go untreated and become more serious,” Everard explained. These infections are spread by sharing needles.
Overdoses are on the rise as well, he said, which in some tragic cases have lead to death. These deaths leave the entire community reeling, not only family and friends.
These issues have prompted the formation of a new group, the Chenango County Substance Abuse Prevention Coalition.
“[The Coalition] is working towards developing a comprehensive plan to address the increase in substance abuse and related health issues,” explained Everard.
Rise of Methamphetamine
Heroin isn’t the only drug causing concern in Chenango County. The use of methamphetamine is also on the rise.
“This is an epidemic in other areas of the country and my fear is it will escalate here because it is highly addictive, quickly impacts neurological function and withdrawal is very difficult,” Everard said. “That’s a combination for disaster.”
While methamphetamine has been seen in Chenango before, a different method is now being used to ‘cook’ the drugs, reported McBride.
Called ‘shake and bake’ or ‘one-pot,’ this method enables someone to manufacture on a small-scale – enough for their own use, as well as to sell to support their habit – in less than an hour. The supplies can be easily purchases and, since it’s all done in a soda bottle, it’s easily transported or hidden.
A week ago, a Sherburne man was arrested for cooking meth on the river bank behind North Main Street in Sherburne using this one-pot method.
There is also an environmental consequence to the process.
“Not only do they create a drug that is highly addictive and ruining lives, but it also has a hazardous by-product,” McBride said, explaining that the New York State Police have a special CERT unit to clean up dumpsites to prevent the hazardous waste from getting into the ground water.
According to the DA, meth is a county-wide problem. In the last year, manufacturing labs have been raided in Greene, Afton, Bainbridge, Sherburne and Norwich.
Detective Mike Purdy of the City of Norwich Police Department was instrumental in a bust in April, which succeeded in keeping 12 grams – close to 300 packets – off the streets. Those drugs had a street value upwards of $2,000 and were also manufactured using the one-pot method.
While meth is a growing concern in the city, it hasn’t gotten a foothold yet, according to Purdy. He attributes that to two things. The first is that, even with the one-pot method, the manufacture of meth remains a smelly process, making it hard to keep under wraps with neighbors close by. The second has to do with the NPD’s own efforts.
“We’re aggressively investigating anyone and any place with the intention of making meth in the city,” he stated.
But meth isn’t the city’s most pressing drug issue. The biggest trend Purdy says he’s seeing is as a result of the absence, rather than the availability, of a particular street drug.
According to the detective, large busts in Utica, Binghamton, Syracuse and New York City have put a crimp in the supply of heroin to the area.
“Through the chain, it affects Norwich,” he explained.
With their drug of choice not as readily available, Purdy said heroin users are turning to another drug: Suboxone.
Another Drug on the Streets
Suboxone is a prescribed medication combining buprenorphine and naloxone designed as a maintenance treatment for those dependent on heroin or other opioids. Like Methodone – which has been used to treat heroin addicts since the mid-1960’s – it suppresses withdrawal symptoms without the euphoric high of heroin. It also blocks the effects of other opioids for a period of time.
Now, Purdy said, it is being over-prescribed and abused much in the way that hydrocodone once was. How? According to the detective, a doctor may write a prescription for as many as 90 pills, giving the patient more than enough for their personal use. The rest can be easily sold.
Because it’s a prescribed medication, combatting it creates a different dynamic for law enforcement, Purdy said, which is a challenge.
Everard agrees that Suboxone has become a ‘major problem’ in Chenango.
“The drug was first seen as a tremendous step forward,” he said, explaining that if prescribed and used correctly, it can be beneficial as a part of treatment plan.
“We have participants in treatment court who are doing well and others who have obtained it illegally and have experienced serious consequences.”
He agrees with Purdy that the problem is in the way the drug is dispensed.
“There are legitimate physicians who closely monitor the drug and collaborate with treatment services and there are physicians who do not,” Everard reported. “Some see it as a ‘cash cow’.”
Because only a limited number of providers are allowed to prescribe the controlled substance - and each of those providers is limited by law to the number of patients they can see – an underground market has emerged.
There are multiple Internet sites designed to help people find doctors who are eligible to prescribe Suboxone’s, and have not yet reached their limit of 100 patients. One such search option – on the drug manufacturer’s own website – revealed the name of 1 provider in Chenango County, but a total of 23 providers within a 50 mile radius of Norwich.
According to Purdy, users aren’t afraid to travel even further than that to secure the medication.
“They have been traveling to a doctor in New Jersey,” he said. “[They] go down by the carload.”
What’s the answer?
There’s no easy answer to Chenango County’s drug problem. A complex issue will take complex solutions.
Law enforcement, prosecutors and the courts will continue to work on cutting off the supply of drugs, but for Everard, the other side of the equation is just as important.
“In my opinion, it is impossible to stop the supply of drugs until we stop the demand for drugs,” he explained.
The first step in decreasing that demand is with the treatment and rehabilitation of current users. Everard makes an impact in those areas every day with his work at Drug Treatment Court. Since the program’s inception in 2004, 262 participants have been helped by the alternative to incarceration program. They continue to help between 30 and 40 new participants each year.
For those that go through the program, it’s more than a way to avoid jail time.
“It’s an opportunity to become productive members of their families and communities in all aspects of their lives, by teaching them the skills necessary to conquer their drug dependency and bring an end to their criminal activity,” Everard explained.
What can be accomplished through the Treatment Court and other current treatment programs is limited, however, due to lack of funding and the policies insurance companies have in place related to the treatment of addiction.
“In my ideal world, treatment would be the priority,” he said. “We would have an treatment system that reacted quickly with no waiting time, the best medical care available and a comprehensive treatment system that addressed all areas of rehabilitation over a longer time period.”
Everard would also like to see a shift in how society views those in recovery. They aren’t bad people, he explained.
“These are sick people trying to get well.”
Employment
Employment opportunities are also needed, according to DA McBride.
“Everyone needs to work,” he explained. “We as a society allow people to be unproductive. That’s when they start abusing drugs. That’s when they start abusing alcohol. That’s when they start abusing their family, …their friends…and the community.”
It is not only creating or identifying these opportunities that is important. The key is also to prepare people to fill those roles. At Back on the Rack in Sherburne, Donna Wood-Craig is doing just that, one person at a time.
“It’s been eye opening for me,” said Wood-Craig, who knew little about Chenango’s drug problem before taking over the thrift store/job-training center for Opportunities for Chenango just under two years ago.
Six of the eight assistants she’s had in the last year and a half came to her with addiction problems. Four were were referred through Drug Treatment Court.
“They’ve all gone on to get paid positions, which I’m very proud of,” she said.
It has been as much of a learning experience for her, as it has been for them. Particular after a personal tragedy brought the county’s heroin problem into sharper perspective.
A week before Christmas, Wood-Craig lost her nephew to an overdose. While she had lost touch with him prior to his death as a result of his life choices, through one of her young assistants, she was able to get to know the person he was beneath his addiction.
Their stories, as well as his, have inspired her.
“It’s become my new mission,” she said.
In June, she became the newest member of Drug Treatment Court’s Advisory Panel, where she adds the perspective of a potential employer.
“Now I’m really getting a close up view of the population,” she said.
Everything she learns has made her more determined to do everything she can to help make a difference in the lives of these young people, to make sure they have a future.
“These are not throw away kids,” she said.
She is currently working with one of those young people, whom society was ready to write off as a junkie before she went to Treatment Court, to create an educational program aimed at keeping kids off drugs.