San Diego Harm Reduction Nonprofit Leaves $200,000 in Unpaid Bills After Executive Fraud

Months before criminal charges surfaced, San Diego's primary naloxone distribution nonprofit had already stopped paying the grassroots organizations and workers who trained residents to reverse overdoses.

Three partner nonprofits are collectively owed nearly $200,000 by the Harm Reduction Coalition of San Diego, according to a March 6 Voice of San Diego investigation. A former contract employee reports she's owed $36,000 for five months of unpaid work. Staff paychecks bounced repeatedly throughout 2024 and into 2025.

The financial chaos predates the February 2026 criminal case against former Chief Operating Officer Amy Knox, who faces felony misappropriation charges. San Diego County District Attorney Summer Stephan estimates Knox spent at least $210,000 in public funds on plastic surgeries, designer purchases, and purebred dogs. Investigators are still tracing another $600,000 that initially passed through Knox's bank accounts.

The Harm Reduction Coalition held two county contracts worth $2.2 million annually when the missed payments started surfacing in 2024. San Diego County cancelled both contracts in late June 2025, but unpaid bills continue to accumulate months later.

The Human Cost of Administrative Failure

The payment crisis hit smaller nonprofits hardest.

A New Path, which trains San Diegans to administer naloxone, was owed $98,820 for five months of work. Executive Director Gretchen Bergman said a nearly $50,000 check bounced in August 2024. When county officials finally acknowledged the problem in September 2024, they directed A New Path back to the Harm Reduction Coalition rather than intervening directly.

"As subcontractors, if we had an issue with our contractor, we were told that we should take it up with the contractor," Bergman told Voice of San Diego.

The missed payments forced A New Path to slash full-time staff hours by 25 percent. Bergman initially gave up her own salary. The nonprofit's annual budget sits under $500,000—the unpaid invoices represented nearly 20 percent of its operating capacity.

A large emergency donation and a direct county contract awarded in August 2025 eventually stabilized A New Path's operations, but workers struggled to reconnect with people experiencing addiction who had relocated during the months-long disruption.

SAY San Diego, another subcontractor providing naloxone training, absorbed a $92,500 shortfall. Executive Louie Nguyen said his staff "got stonewalled" when they sought explanations for the missed payments in early 2025.

Project AWARE, a grassroots organization serving at-risk youth and families, estimates it's owed around $2,000—a small sum that nonetheless contributed to the departure of two workers. Founder Reginald Washington said his team continued training people living in the margins to use naloxone even without payment.

"Individuals have left because we weren't able to pay them," Washington said.

County's Limited Oversight

San Diego County began learning about the Harm Reduction Coalition's payment failures in 2024, according to emails obtained through public records requests. Officials knew the unpaid bills were straining subcontractors and workers, but county responses consistently emphasized that contract language made payment the nonprofit's responsibility.

"The county is not deferring payment responsibility to HRCSD – as the contractor this is their responsibility," county spokesperson Tim McClain wrote in a March 2026 email. "The county is however exploring options for reimbursing the subcontractors that never received payment from HRCSD."

The county maintains it made reimbursements to the Harm Reduction Coalition in accordance with contract terms, rejecting suggestions that delayed county payments contributed to the nonprofit's cash flow problems.

Former Harm Reduction Coalition staffer Jordan Parnes said his bank placed his paychecks on 10-day holds at least six times over seven to eight months. The organization alternated between direct deposits and paper checks, never maintaining consistent payment methods for more than four pay cycles.

Knox told staff at the time that county reimbursement delays for drug testing work caused the cash shortages. Unlike the naloxone contract, which provided upfront funding, the drug checking program required the nonprofit to bill the county after expenses.

County officials say they followed contract procedures, approving expenses after proper documentation and review.

Executive Deception and IRS Irregularities

Morgan Godvin started working on the Harm Reduction Coalition's drug checking contract in March 2025, when subcontractor payments had already stopped. She didn't receive her first paycheck until May—and only after another staffer persuaded her to accept $10,635 instead of the $13,635 she was owed.

Godvin continued working through July 2025, a month after the county cancelled both contracts. She never received the missing $3,000 from her first check or any subsequent payments. She now estimates she's owed more than $36,000.

"I'm one of many people – the wreckage, the ripple effects of that wreckage is almost unfathomable to me to be honest," Godvin said.

Without income, Godvin sold stock investments and accumulated credit card debt to avoid homelessness. Appeals to the county contract administrator, the Office of Ethics and Compliance, and attorneys produced no results.

Harm Reduction Coalition CEO Tara Stamos said she remained unaware of the extent of the payment problems until Knox left the organization in May 2025. Stamos had delegated invoice processing and payments to Knox and was not consistently monitoring email.

"I'm devastated for myself, for them," Stamos said. "I feel like I've disappointed people."

Stamos estimates she received only $40,000 in 2025 salary despite a 2023 IRS tax filing reporting $316,373 in compensation. Stamos now says that filing, prepared by Knox, was inaccurate and requires correction.

"We had no money at the very end," Stamos said.

Systemic Risks in Harm Reduction Funding

The San Diego crisis exposes vulnerabilities in how counties contract for critical overdose prevention services.

Naloxone distribution has become increasingly central to local overdose response strategies as synthetic opioid deaths remain elevated nationwide. The CDC reported 107,543 drug overdose deaths in the 12 months ending June 2024, down 12.7 percent from the prior year but still historically elevated.

When naloxone deployment contracts concentrate with a single organization holding millions in public funds, governance failures create cascading risks across entire service ecosystems. The Harm Reduction Coalition's $2.2 million in annual contracts funded not just its own operations but sustained multiple smaller nonprofits and grassroots groups with specialized community connections.

The payment crisis forced A New Path workers to rebuild trust with people experiencing addiction who had disappeared when services paused. Those relationships—often months or years in development—represent infrastructure as critical as funding itself.

San Diego County is now exploring reimbursement options for unpaid subcontractors, but no timeline or mechanism has been announced. The county emphasizes its contracts explicitly place payment responsibility on primary contractors, not the government entity funding services.

That contractual language may shield the county from legal liability, but it doesn't address the practical reality that vulnerable populations lost access to lifesaving training and naloxone distribution for months while officials clarified jurisdictional responsibilities.

What Happens Next

The District Attorney's criminal case against Amy Knox continues. Investigators are still attempting to account for $600,000 that moved through Knox's accounts beyond the $210,000 cited in the misappropriation charges.

Former Harm Reduction Coalition employees and subcontractors have limited recourse. Godvin and others say they've found no effective mechanism to recover unpaid wages. County officials suggest legal action against the Harm Reduction Coalition as the responsible party, but recovery prospects remain unclear given the organization's depleted resources.

San Diego County awarded new naloxone contracts after cancelling the Harm Reduction Coalition agreements in June 2025. A New Path received direct county funding in August 2025, restoring some service continuity.

The broader question—how counties should structure contracts to prevent similar cascading failures—has no obvious answer. Distributing funds across multiple smaller contractors reduces single-point-of-failure risks but increases administrative overhead and may fragment coordinated approaches. Consolidating funding with larger organizations creates economies of scale but concentrates governance risks.

The San Diego case suggests that financial transparency requirements and more frequent audits may matter more than contract structure. The Harm Reduction Coalition's payment failures were evident to county officials months before Knox's criminal charges emerged, yet intervention came only after contracts were cancelled entirely.

By that point, the damage to San Diego's overdose prevention infrastructure had already cascaded through the nonprofit ecosystem that keeps naloxone accessible in the communities that need it most.