Recovery Month will take place: Faces & Voices of Recovery will run it

Last week, we reported that the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration is walking away from its sponsorship of Recovery Month (see “After 30 years, SAMHSA walks away from Recovery Month,” ADAW, July 8, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/adaw.32770 ). This is correct. However, what needs clarification is this: Recovery Month will still take place, hosted by Faces & Voices of Recovery. Philip Rutherford, director of operations of Faces & Voices of Recovery, told ADAW in an email last week that the organization “is excited to host the Recovery Month website, previously found at recoverymonth.gov .” The new site “will contain a repository for the 2020 Recovery Month digital assets, like graphics and display banners for anyone to download and use, and more. Equally as important, organizations will be able to post information about their events on the Recovery Month calendar.” These materials have “been a staple of the event for years, and Faces & Voices is pleased to be able to keep it going.”     

Table of Contents

Treatment Programs Balance Amenities with Focus on Therapy A Tale of Two Reports: The 1st is Killed, and the 2nd may be Diluted Seabrook Program for Mothers Reflects Diversification of Payer Mix Summit Launches Efforts Against Illicit Fentanyl Use NACoA Rescues SAMHSA Database from Budget Cuts Recovery Month: No Speeches for People Newly in Recovery Report Highlights Successful State Innovations in Behavioral Health Care NEATTC's Innovation Call for Innovative Practices in Workforce Development Briefly Noted Resources Grants and Funding Coming up     

Celebrating Joan Acker: Sociologist,fearless feminist,friend

Joan Acker's life reflects a time when middle‐class women were expected to be satisfied with maintaining the home front, serving husbands and children, not having paid‐work careers. After living “the ideal” for 37 years, Acker took a new path by earning a Ph. D. and producing path‐breaking scholarship that challenged taken‐for‐granted beliefs about gender, family, work, and organizations. Acker spoke “truth to power” and was an academic heroine in posing feminist challenges to injustices involving gender, social class, and race/ethnicity, particularly (but not solely) related to the workplace. This overview lets Joan tell her story and offers reflections on her milestone publications as seen by Pat Martin.     

Don't Let Your Disease Define You

Vivian Stephenson directed information technology systems at numerous companies, including Target Corporation, as Executive Vice President and Chief Information Officer, and Williams-Sonoma, as Chief Operating Officer and Chief Information Officer. In 1994, Vivian was a recipient of the “Oscar” of information technology—the Smithsonian Institution and Computerworld Award—for developing the Planned Store Inventory System at Mervyn's Corporation. Vivian is a former chair of the Board of Trustees at Mills College, from which she received a Doctor of Humane Letters Honorary Degree in 2005 for her “ethical and compassionate leadership” and for serving as “an inspired, unwavering advocate for women and the power of education to transform women's lives and society as a whole.” Vivian survived two different types of breast cancer, diagnosed in 1980 and 1996. In 2009, she was diagnosed with stage IV ovarian cancer.     

The Phenomenon Of The Public Wife: An Exercise In Goffman's Impression Management*

Approaching the topic of American leader-image from the perspective of politics-as-theater (political communication as exchange of symbols), this paper examines a taken-for-granted visual symbol which a national political leader is invariably expected to present: a wife. Her contributions to her husband's “impression management” techniques (Goffman, 1959) are studied in Goffman's “defensive” categories of dramaturgical loyalty, dramaturgical discipline, and dramaturgical circumspection. This analysis suggests that the visible presence of a wife in public leadership rituals offers the public voter or viewer important reassurances or symbolic guarantees about her husband's “morality”—and, therefore, his appropriateness for public trust. She has become a necessary partof his public performance because of our everyday need for “cultural absolutes” (Furay, 1977) in the image of our leadership figures.     

Briefly Noted

Carmen Beatrice Pearman Arlt died last December after a long illness. News of her death started circulating throughout the field only last month, however. Arlt, a longtime Indiana resident, was born in 1955. She organized one of the oldest chapters of the National Alliance for Medication Assisted Recovery (NAMA Recovery), the Methadone Advocacy Group (MAG) of Indiana. NAMA Recovery Director Joycelyn Woods recalled last week that Arlt, in the early 1990s, sent an index card to NAMA Recovery with dimes taped to it and a short message saying she could not afford the $10 membership fee. “Like all letters we receive from patients, she received a letter back saying that we would rather have her advocacy than money,” said Woods. One of the things MAG of Indiana did was clean the street around the methadone clinic. “While they were out picking up garbage and sweeping the street, the reverend from the church across the street came out to warn them about those addicts over there. Carmen explained that they were those addicts,” said Woods. “From this encounter, patients were given space in the church to set up 12‐Step groups and to have meetings. The following year, there was a big drug conference in Indiana, and the chapter acted as the color guard for the governor when he entered the arena. I remember Carmen sending a picture of them all dressed in white shirts, navy bowties for women and regular ties for men and navy pants.” Arlt received the Nyswander/Dole Award from the American Association for the Treatment of Opioid Dependence in 2001 for organizing the state provider organization — at the time, Indiana had no opioid treatment program representation and clinics saw one another more as competitors than associates working for a common cause, said Woods. More recently, in addition to being president of NAMA Recovery, Arlt developed the program for women and children at Porter‐Starke Services in Valparaiso. She was continuing her education to get a Ph.D. in social work when she became ill. “NAMA Recovery will miss Ms. Pearman‐Arlt's dedication and compassion to patients and the field,” said Woods..     

NASADAD calls for nominations for annual SSA award

The National Association of State Alcohol and Drug Abuse Directors (NASADAD) is requesting nominations for the annual Ramstad/Kennedy Award, presented to a single state agency (SSA) — the state director who is responsible for the Substance Abuse Prevention and Treatment block grant (and STR and SOR grants, now).     

Treatment center sues Tennessee town over zoning ordinance

Last week, ReVIDA Recovery Centers, which provides medication‐assisted treatment for opioid use disorder, announced that it would sue to keep its treatment program in Morristown, Tennessee, where the city has denied the company based on zoning. “Our patients are our first priority,” said CEO Lee Dilworth on September 25.     

Briefly Noted

At last week's annual conference of the National Association for Behavioral Healthcare (NABH), the increase in managed care figured prominently as causing a significant barrier to access to treatment. “The issue that is front and center is access to care, the problems that people are having getting necessary care, and not being able to access the right care at the right time,” NABH President and CEO Mark Covall told ADAW. In addition, the continuum of care has been severely impacted by managed care, he said. “Managed care companies are restricting care to crisis care only,” he said. This means that the longer‐term care needed for recovery when patients emerge from a crisis is not being covered. There are no clear legislative or regulatory fixes yet, said Covall, speaking by phone from the busy meeting. As an organization, NABH “will continue to be proactive and reach out to managed care companies,” he said. “We hope the collaboration that is desperately needed will be a two‐way street.” NABH members have reported that “it has been exceedingly difficult to get patients the care they need, and our members are saying that it's hurting patients, and this is not acceptable.” Last week, NABH launched Access to Care, an initiative “that will send our message to policymakers, regulators, payers and patient advocates that only true access to care can lead to recovery.”     

Communities in criminal networks: A case study

Criminal organizations tend to be clustered to reduce risks of detection and information leaks. Yet, the literature exploring the relevance of subgroups for their internal structure is so far very limited. The paper applies methods of community analysis to explore the structure of a criminal network representing the individuals’ co-participation in meetings. It draws from a case study on a large law enforcement operation (“Operazione Infinito”) tackling the ‘Ndrangheta, a mafia organization from Calabria, a southern Italian region. The results show that the network is indeed clustered and that communities are associated, in a non-trivial way, with the internal organization of the ‘Ndrangheta into different “locali” (similar to mafia families). Furthermore, the results of community analysis can improve the prediction of the “locale” membership of the criminals (up to two thirds of any random sample of nodes) and the leadership roles (above 90% precision in classifying nodes as either bosses or non-bosses). The implications of these findings on the interpretation of the structure and functioning of the criminal network are discussed.     

More Than Help? Volunteerism in US Latino Culture

Volunteerism makes critical contributions to individual lives and society as a whole. However, to date, few studies have investigated volunteerism within Latino communities, a large and growing US population. The aim of this study was to understand how non-metropolitan US Latinos perceive volunteerism, as well as to determine what motivates and what deters their participation in volunteer programs. Our research team conducted six focus groups with 36 Latina women living in the State of Illinois. The focus groups covered topics such as the definition of volunteerism, participation motives and barriers, personal volunteer experience, and Latino culture, community, and organizations. We also assessed demographic information. Results from this study indicate that Latinas have a unique understanding of the concept of volunteerism. Participants associated everyday “helping” with volunteerism, establishing commonplace forms of aid as perhaps a “Latino way of volunteering.” We found time-consuming activities such as family responsibilities and work to be deterrents to Latinas participating in more formal volunteer activities.     

Save the World on Your Own Time: Or, What’s the Matter with Sociology?

This essay explores the question of why sociology departments, compared to other university departments, are often viewed negatively by higher-level administrators (deans, provosts, chancellors and presidents). We are asked to consider, as sociologists, how departments are ranked and evaluated by administrators. The characteristics of any good university department are identified (e.g., grants, support from alumni, publications, quality of teaching, national rankings, student enrollments); and, the characteristics of dynamic and healthy departments are outlined (e.g., student learning is primary; there is a commitment to the goals of the larger organization; leadership is provided by the unit to solve all-university problems; there is a focus on learning; faculty are productive; there are strong communication links across the organization). The question is posed and then systemically answered as to how sociology departments compare in terms of these standards. It is suggested that a major factor in terms of how and why sociology departments are negatively evaluated is the fact that sociology uses narratives of power and explanations of organizational behavior that are inherently oppositional, i.e., there is an “us” and “them” mentally that sometimes develops. Other reasons for organizational marginalization are identified such as the “canon wars” and their lingering effects, and the fact that the sociological enterprise has been diluted by the teaching of “sociology” in many other campus units, such as composition programs. Finally, questions are raised about how sociology, as an intellectual enterprise, differs from other disciplines in terms of pedagogy, the sequencing of courses, “grand” theory, and forms of apprenticeship. It is recommended that sociologists act positively to help the organizations within which they work to identify common problems and solve them. It is argued that sociology can and should “own” the area of civic engagement as a means of making a positive and distinctive contribution. Sociological “stories” grounded in the reality of everyday life are compelling. It is suggested that sociologists need to deepen connections with their communities and to offer real solutions to real problems.     

Neue Arbeitswelt,Führung und organisationaler WandelNew Economy,Leadership and Organizational Change.

This article of the journal “Gruppe. Interaktion. Organisation.” analyzes and discusses current changes in the working environment with regard to the associated opportunities and risks. Due to the growing dynamism of the markets, digitization, the demographic change and the change of values the importance of flexibility and changeability as central prerequisites for organizational survival is rising constantly. At the same time organizations and employees make higher demands on each other. This shift in the “psychological contract” between employees and organization is discussed in the light of the characteristics of “generation Y”. The article concludes by summarizing consequences of these developments for work in organizations, leadership, change processes and consulting.     

Table of Contents

Connecticut Agency Finds Success with Variety of Recovery Support Workers NAADAC Survey Highlights Loan Forgiveness, Other Issues for Workforce NIDA Partners with AMA to Add Addiction to Medical School New Credential from NAADAC and NACoA for Faith Leaders Idaho Officials Adopt GAIN for Assessment of Substance Abuse Briefly Noted Names in the News Resources Coming up     

Names in the News

Linda Rosenberg, longtime president and CEO of the National Council for Behavioral Health, who announced she would be leaving almost a year ago (see ADAW, April 30, 2018), will be replaced by Chuck Ingoglia, who has been in charge of public policy at the Washington, D.C.–based group since 2005, on June 1. “On behalf of the National Council Board of Directors, I am pleased to announce that after a comprehensive national selection process, the board is delighted to appoint Chuck Ingoglia to the role of president and CEO,” said Jeff Richardson, chair of the board of directors. Richardson said Ingoglia's more than 20 years experience in behavioral health policy made him “the clear choice to lead the National Council into the future.” Prior to joining the National Council, Ingoglia provided policy and program design guidance to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration; he also directed state government relations and service system improvement projects for the National Mental Health Association (now Mental Health America), served as a policy analyst for the National Association of Social Workers and designed educational programs for mental health and addictions professionals at the Association for Ambulatory Behavioral Healthcare. “We are very grateful to Linda for 15 years of outstanding leadership and fortunate that Chuck has accepted the position. Chuck is a proven leader and the best choice from a deep pool of interested and highly qualified candidates from across the country,” said Richardson. “His vision and strategy are exactly what the National Council needs as we enter our next chapter.”     

Homelessness in Ottawa County Michigan: The “Gap” Population

Abstract

Homelessness has gained increasing attention since the 1980s in the United States. And the numbers of individuals and families experiencing homelessness are growing, with a 20,000 person, or 3% increase, from 2008 through 2009 (“State of Homelessness,” 2011). In spite of persistent investigation and activism on how to prevent and end homelessness, there is not agreement on what causes homelessness or how to stop it (McNamara, 2009). What is apparent, however, is that the homeless population is not homogenous. Therefore, the standard models of service, whether from governmental or non-governmental organizations (NGOs), end up neglecting the needs of portions of the population of people who face homelessness. Governmental and non-governmental service providers have recognized the existence of the unique sub-populations of people who are homeless and are attempting to understand and meet the needs of people outside the prevailing understanding of homelessness. This project works with a collaborative of such service providers through a multiple methodological approach to generate better understanding on the two key areas necessary to create models of service for people who are in the “gap” subsector of the homeless population. First, investigation was undertake to learn systematically who is included in the “gap” population among the homeless community, or, in other words, what traits those who continue to cycle in and out of homelessness, and thus are part of this “gap” population, share. Secondly, the project explores what organizations are currently serving these people, and how are they doing so. In other words, this project also ask what are the trends or practices that exist nationally and locally for serving people who fall into this category of homelessness? Findings suggest central traits including mental illness, substance abuse and a history of incarceration as factors spanning members of the “gap” population. Though there are caveats and practices to be avoided, these people are surviving or even thriving through the service primarily of faith-based non-governmental organizations, unfettered by the policy and funding constraints of governmental entities.     

Scarce as hen's teeth: Women CEOs in large nonprofit organizations

This study examines an underlying mechanism behind the gender gap in nonprofit executive leadership, focusing on the link between the representation of women on governing boards and the hiring of female CEOs. The analysis of 340 human services organizations with gross receipts greater than $10 million in GuideStar's database reveals that organizations where women make up between one third and half of the board are more likely to have a female CEO compared to organizations where women account for less than one third or a majority of the board. The findings suggest that nonprofit organizations are more likely to hire a female CEO when women constitute a “substantial minority” of the governing board.