Scott Announces Grants To Combat Overdoses In Baltimore After Another Mass Overdose Event

By Danielle J. Brown, Maryland Matters

October 10, 2025

Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott (D) on Thursday announced an upcoming grant program for opioid reduction efforts, an announcement that came on the heels of the city’s third mass overdose event in recent months.

Scott said he hopes the new grants, funded with money from the settlements of lawsuits against opioid manufacturers, can help prevent future mass overdose events and provide individuals struggling with addiction easier access to resources.

“This is not the first overdose incident we’ve seen at Penn North in recent months and we continue to do everything that we can to support our residents,” Scott said Thursday during a virtual briefing of the grant program.

“We know we have work to do, but we have never been in a better position to end this crisis,” he said. “We have the will. We have the people. And most importantly now, we have the funding.”

Scott’s comments came as he was announcing an upcoming opportunity for community organizations and support services to receive grants to help combat drug overdoses in the city. Through community grants under the Opioid Restitution Fund, organizations can compete for up to $500,000 in funding, depending on their project proposals.

The total grant funding allocated for fiscal 2026 is $2 million, a fraction of the $579.9 million that Baltimore has received through court settlements.

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In 2018, the city opted out of national legal challenges of pharmaceutical companies for their role in the opioid epidemic, choosing to pursue its own lawsuit instead. It was a risky move but it paid off: The more than half a billion the city has raked in in settlements is far above what it would have received as part of a larger group.

Last year, Scott issued an executive order creating the Opioid Restitution Fund, which helps direct the settlement payments to combat opioid and overdoses in the city over the next 15 years. The $2 million offered in the upcoming grant program is just one part of a larger system of opioid reduction efforts that the city will be taking through those settlement funds.

“While there is no simple solution to solve this crisis overnight, we will continue to push to save every life that we can,” Scott said.

The city will launch a grant application portal Oct. 23, with information for organizations interested in applying for a grant, which would not be distributed until the next calendar year.

The grant program will focus on three areas for overdose response:

Programs aiming to increase access to mobile overdose treatment services could receive up to $500,000 in grant funds.

Organizations focused on harm reduction could get up to $250,000. Such efforts include increased distribution of the opioid overdose reversal medication naloxone, clean-syringe services and wound care, among others.

The grant program will also apply to more general social support services. Organizations focused on providing access to housing, food assistance, education and employment could get up to $50,000 in grant funding from the program.

The request for proposals officially opens Oct. 23. “This RFP is about investing back into the neighborhoods that have been the hardest-hit by the opioid crisis and keeping the priorities and needs of Baltimore City residents front and center,” Scott said Thursday.

He added that investigations on the Wednesday overdose incident are ongoing. In that incident, 11 nonfatal overdoses occurred near the Penn North neighborhood, with seven people hospitalized and four people declining transport, according to news reports.

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Wednesday’s incident followed dozens more overdoses that occurred this summer. On July 10, a mass overdose sent 27 people to the hospital for treatment. A week later, five more people were hospitalized after an overdose.

Sara Whaley, executive director of overdose response for the city, said that she hopes the grants from the opioid settlement fund support programs that help prevent more mass overdoses.

“In light of the overdoses yesterday and the mass overdose events in July, we know just how critical this work is to saving lives,” she said.

“Mobile services can go where they are needed because they are not tied to brick and mortar,” she said. “Having more of these types of programs that can go throughout the city and go to areas or be responsive to things like a mass overdose event, to bring services directly where they are needed – I think that allows us a lot of flexibility.”

She stressed that the mobile services will also help with smaller or individual overdoses. She said that city officials focused on opioid reduction were already interested in boosting mobile services before the mass overdose incidents this year.

“Mobile services are one option,” Whaley said. “That in addition to naloxone distribution. Other things, like drug-checking programs, drug-testing supplies, would care and things like that … can also help facilitate connections to treatment or other supportive services.”