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HARRISBURG â On his drive to and from the state Capitol, state Rep. Mark Gillen often sees a state trooperâs vehicle.
âThey usually donât yell out the window to slow down,â said Gillen, a Berks County Republican. âIf youâre going too fast, youâre going to get stopped, and youâre going to get fined, and it changes behavior.â
Thatâs the argument Gillen is making as he tries to convince fellow lawmakers to give the Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs the power to fine licensed addiction treatment facilities for violating state rules.
The $431 million agency is in charge of inspecting more than 800 facilities that provide care to some of the most vulnerable people in Pennsylvania. The state is at the epicenter of the opioid epidemic, ranking among the top states for overdose deaths.
WHYY
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On his drive to and from the state Capitol, state Rep. Mark Gillen often sees a state trooper’s vehicle.
“They usually don’t yell out the window to slow down,” said Gillen, a Berks County Republican. “If you’re going too fast, you’re going to get stopped, and you’re going to get fined, and it changes behavior.”
That’s the argument Gillen is making as he tries to convince fellow lawmakers to give the Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs the power to fine licensed addiction treatment facilities for violating state rules.
The $431 million agency is in charge of inspecting more than 800 facilities that provide care to some of the most vulnerable people in Pennsylvania. The state is at the epicenter of the opioid epidemic, ranking among the top states for overdose deaths.
Inspectors can issue citations and require providers to submit plans of correction, but they can’t fine facilities for violations a tool some in the industry say could weed out bad actors and prevent ongoing harm. The department can also issue provisional licenses a designation indicating a provider failed to meet several state requirements tell a facility to reduce the number of clients it serves, or attempt to permanently revoke a license. But strong disciplinary action is rarely taken, the investigation found. As of early April, the agency had revoked just one treatment provider’s license since 2012. Experts, state officials, clients, and facility employees who spoke to Spotlight PA and KHN raised a number of possible improvements including frequent unannounced inspections to give the department a more accurate view of a treatment facility’s typical practices. The public could also be given easier access to more information about past actions taken against facilit