“Parents who suffer from these issues don’t provide a good home life, and lead the kids to make the same poor decisions.”
The drug issue and how it impacts our community dominated our community conversations. Both opioid and meth addiction run high and show lasting impacts on parents and children. This negatively affects our overall community safety and our local economy.
What we do
Our Substance Use Disorders Impact Council focuses on well-rounded approaches to supporting prevention, treatment, and recovery solutions. We believe that by providing supports to substance use disorder prevention and treatment programs, we can help break the cycle of poverty.
View our strategy guide for detailed information about our beliefs, measurements, and activities. VIEW GUIDE
Impact Council
Our Substance Use Disorders Impact Council, a multi-sector volunteer committee of nonprofit, government, education, and business leaders who are experts in and/or are passionate about supporting prevention, treatment, and recovery solutions in our community.
They want our communities to recognize substance use as a public health issue that is preventable and treatable. And they want those suffering to be met with dignity and respect in the absence of stigma and prejudice, as each community embraces recovery and a drug-free, healthy Wabash Valley.
The impact council will work and invest in order to bring successful results to the agreed-upon specific outcome targets in support of the overall UWWV community goal.
Quick Links to Council Info
Objective: Reduce our community-wide prevalence of substance use disorders
Strategies
Growth of Treatment/Recovery Providers
Development of Resource for a Full Continuum of Care
Prevention Strategy for Youth
Expand Practical Life-Assistance Recovery Supports
Measures
Substance Use-Related Arrests
Substance Use-Related Department of Child Services Child Removal Cases
Indiana Youth Survey Substance Use Statistics
Substance Use Disorder Impact Council Solutions
Peer Recovery Specialist Grant
The Impact Council is investing $50,000 over the next two years in the Next Step Foundation to recruit, coordinate, manage, and monitor peer-led training for Peer Recovery Specialists in our local community. These specialists are used to aid in substance use disorder treatment that utilizes the lived experiences of the path of recovery, combined with training and supervision, to assist others in their journey of recovery.
Next Step has already trained over 50 individuals with 19 of them becoming employed as certified peer coaches.
County Jail Mentoring Grant
The Impact Council is investing $68,000 over the next two years to support mentorship programs in our county jails with a focus on substance use to support and prepare inmates for sobriety and reentry.
Our community partner’s programs include:
Next Step Foundation – is providing mentoring support for men and women who are incarcerated in Vigo, Parke, Clay, Vermillion, and Sullivan county jails with a target goal to provide 120 mentoring relationships per year total for all 5 counties.
Hamilton Center – is focusing on youth at the Vigo County Juvenile Detention Center with over 100 children already being mentored.
Risk Education and Anti-Stigma Programming Grant
The Impact Council is investing $101,500 over the next two years to expand prevention programs that focus on understanding the risks of substance use. According to the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, 90% of people who have an addiction started to drink alcohol or use drugs before they were 18 years old.
Our community partner’s programs include:
Chances and Services for Youth – will provide Too Good for Drugs programming to 6th-9th graders in the Vigo County School Corporation to build up social and emotional competencies to reduce risk factors for substance abuse.
Catholic Charities Ryves Youth Center – will expand the TIME for Me Mentoring Program to more children which provides substance use risk education and builds positive skills and behaviors.
Mental Health America – will expand the Too Good for Drugs program to Sullivan County 4th and 5th-grade students and pilot a Character Strong program for 3rd graders in Sullivan Elementary that promotes positive brain health, self-worth, and positive character traits.
Rural Communities Opioid Response Funding
The United Way’s Substance Use Disorder Impact Council has been awarded over $1.2 million from the HRSA Federal Office of Rural Health Policy for planning and implementation over the next 3 years to expand service delivery for substance use disorders and opioid use disorders in our rural service area communities of Sullivan, Parke, and Vermillion counties. This funding will provide programming by United Way, Chances and Services for Youth, Hamilton Center, Next Step Foundation, and Valley Professionals Community Health Center including:
– A new Substance Use trained Case Manager and Counselor to support Vermillion county
– Hiring and training nine new health and social service professional interns
– Three new Peer Recover Centers with expanded telehealth and 24/7 call operations
– Two new Recovery Residences
– Over 2,000 students enrolled in new school-based, evidence-based, teacher-led prevention programs per year
– Increased educational programming and marketing surrounding substance use prevention, treatment, and recovery strategies
– Nine new permanent drug take-back sites and six collection events
Substance Use Disorder Council Community Measurement Dashboard
This dashboard tracks specific measurements identified by the Substance Use Disorders Impact Council as key indicators of the impact of the council’s work. Use the “Arrests”, “Child Removals”, and “Youth Use” buttons at the top of the dashboard to navigate between the measurements and their associated data.
This dashboard is interactive, and you can filter data in many ways by clicking on specific counties, data categories, or specific months such as in a heat map. For example, if you would like to only view arrest data for Vigo county, you can click on Vigo county in the small county map. Multiple filters can be applied by holding down your CTRL-key. Remove filters by clicking the already-selected filter again. If you wish to erase all filters and start over, refresh the page.
Please note that the dashboard above may not function properly if your internet browser does not allow third-party cookies or if you are viewing the dashboard in an incognito browser.
Sources: Arrest data is obtained through jail bookings reports provided by local Sheriffs Offices and is updated quarterly. Data on child removal cases is provided by the Indiana Division of Child Services and the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services and is updated annually. Data on youth use is obtained from the Indiana Youth Survey and is updated annually.
Note that the State of Illinois does allow medical/recreational use of marijuana by adults aged 21 and over. This may lead to fewer marijuana-related arrests in Clark County, Illinois. However, some arrests for Marijuana do still occur. For more information on what is allowed in Illinois regarding Marijuana use and possession, review Illinois’s Cannabis Regulation and Tax Act.
Substance Use Disorder Council Measurement Report 2021
This measurement report allows the Council to consistently track and report on their agreed-upon substance use disorders-related metrics at the local level to evaluate the efficiency of their investments in reducing the negative impacts of substance use disorders on our communities, as well as inform future investments.
Thank you to our Corporate Sponsor

Substance Use Disorders Impact Council Members - Development Team
Composed of volunteers who are passionate and/or experts in the field of substance use disorders. They are responsible for developing ideas to make progress towards their agreed upon measurements.
Myra Wilkey – Co-Chair
Mental Health America – West Central IN
Dana Simons – Co-Chair
Next Step Foundation
Lauren Baines
Indiana State University
Josh DeVeau
TI Films
Hayley Dorsett
Indiana Center for Recovery
Samantha Faulkner
Hickory Treatment Center Rockville
DeAnna Griffin
The Avenues
Brandon Halleck
Chances and Services for Youth
Larry Hopper
Vigo County Drug Task Force
Deb Kesler
Vigo County Juvenile Court
Amy Kline-Bulter
Anabranch Recovery
Hailee Lauritzen
Indiana State University
Josh Michael
Odyssey House Recovery Residence
Cathie Moore
Qsource
Becky Myers
Valley Professionals Community Health
Jim Palmer
Vigo County Drug Task Force
Jill Pastore
Child-Adult Resource Services
Christy Pearison
Sweet P’s Agape Cafe
Matthew Rains
Vigo County Drug Task Force
Maci Valdez
Substance Misuse Prevention and Mental Health Promotion
Nichole Young
RoBailey Consulting
Substance Use Disorders Impact Council Members - Resource Team
Composed of volunteers who provide financial oversight for the resources entrusted to the impact council.
John McSweeney – Chair
Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology
Tammy Boland
Terre Haute City Council & Elanco
Sarah Briley
Richard G. Lugar Center for Rural Health
John Lukens
Retired – USI
Kelly Marshall
Fifth Third Bank
Scott Monnet
Family Support Services of West Central Indiana
Joni Wise
Vigo County Health Department