The Highland County Board of Commissioners announced its plan to enter into the Ohio Janssen Settlement at its weekly Wednesday morning meeting.
Jeff Duncan, board president, said there have been some class actions lawsuits taken on some drug companies in the past for over prescribing or over pushing opioids. He said Janssen was one of those companies, as well as Johnson and Johnson. He said that counties were asked individually if they wanted to participate and that each county needed to decide by Dec. 8.
Commissioner Terry Britton said the commissioners reviewed its options with its legal team and agreed to participate in this specific settlement.
Commissioner David Daniels said that for the county to be able to participate and get financial restitution, the county and commissioners have to join in the suit.
According to the National Opioid Settlement website, 70 percent of the money must be used to fund “opioid-remediation efforts.” The website said that for all the different possible settlements, Highland County’s estimated potential settlement amount is $782,152 for a Direct Payment to the Subdivision. Seventy percent of that total amount is $547,507.
In other news, Duncan said that next week’s meeting of the Highland County Board of Commissioners will be moved to Tuesday, Dec. 7, because the County Commissioners Association annual meeting is next week and the Highland County commissioners will be in Columbus from Wednesday through Friday for that event.
The board of commissioners also approved a Based Corrections Program 407 Subsidy Grant between the state of Ohio, the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction and Highland County.
In other news, there were three resolutions approved by the board of commissioners, which are as follows:
* Res No. 21-219 is an authorization for a budget modification within T-27 Jail Diversion in the amount of $4,614.
* Res No. 21-220 is an authorization for a budget modification within T-29 Pre-Trial Supervision in the amount of $5,066.
* Res No. 21-221 is an authorization for a budget modification within T-31 JRIG in the amount of $606.
Reach Jacob Clary at 937-402-2570.
