Maine Subdivisions Spend $3M in Opioid Settlement Funds as New Transparency Law Takes Effect

Maine's 39 counties, cities, and towns spent just over $3 million from opioid settlement funds in 2025, marking the first year that local governments were required to publicly disclose their spending decisions under a new state transparency law.

The data, compiled by the Maine Opioid Settlement Support Center at the University of Southern Maine and obtained through a public records request by The Maine Monitor, reveals that roughly 40 percent of the funds went to police departments and county jails, with the remainder supporting community-based treatment, harm reduction initiatives, and youth prevention programs.

More than $19 million in settlement funds remain unspent in local government accounts, with another $50 million scheduled to flow in over the next dozen years as part of Maine's share of nationwide pharmaceutical litigation settlements.

Settlement Funds and Oversight Challenges

Maine's portion of the multi-state opioid settlements totals more than $230 million, divided among 39 direct share subdivisions, the attorney general's office, and the Maine Recovery Council. Payments began in 2022 and will continue through 2038.

The settlements stem from years of litigation against companies including Purdue Pharma, McKesson Corp., and CVS Pharmacy, accused of profiting from misleading marketing campaigns that fueled widespread pharmaceutical opioid addiction. While settlement agreements include a 15-page approved use list, oversight is largely delegated to individual states.

Local governments across Maine have struggled to determine appropriate spending priorities and governance structures since payments began. Some officials faced criticism for making decisions behind closed doors or directing funds toward projects with unclear connections to opioid crisis response.

Penobscot County drew scrutiny last year after the Bangor Daily News reported that its opioid settlement committee held meetings without public disclosure. Franklin County dissolved its settlement committee in 2024 amid accusations of conflicts of interest and personal bias before reforming it after consulting with the USM support center.

Where the Money Went in 2025

Twenty-nine local governments reported spending settlement funds in 2025. The largest expenditures included:

Law Enforcement and Corrections: Nine municipalities—Augusta, Brunswick, Gorham, Lewiston, Lincoln County, Sanford, Somerset County, South Portland, and Waterville—allocated a combined $685,000 for behavioral health liaisons working alongside police departments to respond to mental health and substance use crisis calls.

Androscoggin, Hancock, Knox, and Penobscot counties directed funds toward medication-assisted treatment programs in county jails. Since a 2019 court order mandated that all Maine jails and prisons provide substance use disorder treatment, many sheriffs have characterized this requirement as an unfunded mandate.

Penobscot County's sole 2025 expenditure was $181,000 for medication-assisted treatment in its jail. "The state has refused to pay for methadone treatment when an individual becomes incarcerated," Toni Dyer, the county's HR director, explained in an email. "In order to meet continuity of treatment, and comply with individual treatment plans, the county has been using opioid funds to cover the additional expense of methadone and a liaison position."

In December 2025, Penobscot County commissioners approved an additional $400,000 in grants for 12 organizations recommended by the county's settlement funds committee.

Community-Based Treatment and Recovery: Hundreds of thousands of dollars supported local recovery centers—community hubs offering peer recovery coaching, support meetings, and resource navigation services. Just over a third of funding recipients were community organizations including the Mid-Coast Recovery Coalition, Healthy Androscoggin, and the Aroostook Community Action Program.

Prevention and Youth Programming: Oxford County allocated $82,000 to MaineHealth for expanding its "Building Resilient Families" prevention initiative targeting K-12 students in the Oxford Hills School District. Westbrook spent just over $5,000 supporting Westbrook High School's prevention programs and driver's education classes for two students in recovery.

Other approved projects included workforce re-entry programs for people in recovery, mobile treatment vans serving people experiencing homelessness, HIV testing incentives, overdose response training for community members, and youth mentoring services.

Several subdivisions provided direct financial assistance to individuals in recovery, including scholarships for recovery housing, grocery gift cards, bus tickets, phone minutes, and survival supplies such as tents and sleeping bags for unhoused residents.

Decision-Making Processes Under Scrutiny

The new reporting law mandates that local governments submit annual spending reports each January. While the law only requires spending data, the USM support center also requested information about decision-making structures, governance policies, and monitoring procedures. All subdivisions except Knox County provided responses.

In most cases, final spending decisions rest with county commissioners or city and town councils, sometimes including municipal or county administrators. In Auburn and Falmouth, the town or city manager makes decisions independently. Eighteen subdivisions established opioid settlement task forces or committees, though most serve in advisory roles only.

Calais, Cumberland County, Kennebunk, Rockland, and Waldo County give their task forces a direct role in final decisions. More than half of local governments reported that police departments or sheriff's offices participate in the decision-making process.

Fourteen counties and municipalities said that people directly affected by the opioid crisis advised decision makers but were not included in final decision-making bodies—a structure that Courtney Gary-Allen, executive director of the Maine Recovery Access Project, would like to see change.

"What I would like to see across the state of Maine is that people with lived experience have meaningful say over what this money is spent on," Gary-Allen said, emphasizing the origin of the funds. "It is blood money collected on the grief and the pain of people who were mass marketed to by opiate [makers] like Purdue Pharma and others."

Gary-Allen praised advocates who pushed for the transparency bill but noted concerns about settlement funds being used to cover what should be state obligations. While she considers jail-based addiction treatment critical, she would prefer to see "once-in-a-generation" money directed toward creative community-based solutions rather than sustaining existing government programs.

Ten Subdivisions Have Not Yet Spent Funds

A quarter of local governments reported spending no money in 2025. York County and Kennebec County have made spending decisions but not yet distributed funds: York County plans to put all of its settlement money toward a $21 million recovery center in Alfred, while Kennebec County will direct funds to addiction treatment in its jail.

The eight other non-spending subdivisions—Auburn, Falmouth, Piscataquis County, Saco, Waldo County, Wells, Windham, and the town of York—said they remained in the planning phase.

Data Quality and Future Reporting

The USM support center spent approximately six weeks cleaning submitted data, flagging more than half of the reports for quality issues including typos, unclear project descriptions, and dollar discrepancies.

The primary challenge subdivisions faced was the quick turnaround between the calendar year's end and the January 15 reporting deadline, which left little time for year-end expenditures to clear. The center's report suggested this timeline "may warrant legislative adjustment."

Public data dashboards displaying spending by subdivisions, the attorney general's office, and the Maine Recovery Council are expected to launch later this month on the MOSS Center website.

Attorney General Aaron Frey established the Maine Opioid Settlement Support Center using $2.5 million from his office's settlement allocation after recognizing that local governments needed technical assistance. The center has fulfilled more than 100 requests for help from subdivisions since its creation.

Dr. Lindsey Smith, the center's director, reported in fall 2025 that multiple subdivisions consulted the center after receiving criticism for lack of transparency or inadequate decision-making processes.

The report will be presented to the Maine Legislature's health and human services committee on Wednesday.