A MESSAGE FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR This has been a year of many exciting developments at Gándara Center. We launched new programs that have enabled us to even better serve our communities and expand our innovative care to more of the state’s most vulnerable populations. I am proud of our agency’s ability to recognize and meet the unique needs of the people we serve. We are always looking for new ways to make a difference, and that is why we constantly conduct needs assessments in our communities and respond with new initiatives. Indeed, Gándara Center has long played an active advocacy role as allies to our clients: our recent endeavors are perfect examples of the way we aggressively seek new ways to more comprehensively serve hard-to-reach populations. In the pages ahead you will read about such efforts as our community Spanish Narcan trainings: last fall, Gándara Center teamed up with Tapestry to offer community trainings in the use of Narcan, a medication that reverses the effects of an opioid overdose. The opioid epidemic has hit Hispanic and African American communities particularly hard. Because overdose prevention education is critical for community health and well-being, we were determined to provide Narcan trainings in Spanish to make these events more accessible to Latinos. In another much-needed project, our MISSION Re-entry Program for prisoners at the Plymouth County Correctional Facility expands access to pre- and post-release services for offenders to prevent recidivism. The cycle of re-incarceration is an increasing problem for incarcerated men who have substance use disorder and co-occurring mental health issues. A grant from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration will fund this far-reaching program that fills gaps in treatment and services. The Plymouth Recovery Center, which opened in July of 2017, is designed after the peer recovery support centers we operate in Brockton, Holyoke, and Hyannis. Peer support has always been an important part of Gándara’s culture of recovery. For decades we have hired staff with lived experience to support those in early recovery, and you will read about two of these members of the Gándara family, John Martinez and Phaedra Carco, in this Annual Report. Our latest peer recovery initiative, the Training to Work program for prospective recovery coaches at our Stairway to Recovery support center in Brockton, graduated its first class last June. Recovery coaching is a relatively new and exciting frontier in addiction services and has proven to be an effective tool in helping people continue their recovery process.
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