Suffolk Comptroller John Kennedy launches audit of opioid settlement program

The Suffolk County comptroller’s office has launched a formal audit of the county’s Opioid Settlement Fund, two weeks after Newsday reported that a top former county official who developed the process for applying to the program took a job at a nonprofit that was previously awarded more than $1.8 million from the fund.

In an April 5 letter to Suffolk Health Commissioner Gregson Pigott, Suffolk County Comptroller John Kennedy said the “performance audit” of the fund would cover the period from July 1, 2021 through June 30, 2024, a time span for which the county has awarded more than $57 million in funding. Most awards are paid out over three years.

Information requested for the audit includes “copies of all executed contracts with grant recipients and any contract drafts in negotiation,” as well as executive orders pertaining to the fund, a list of opioid settlement funding selection committee members and minutes of committee meetings.

As Newsday has reported, the committee met behind closed doors to determine funding awards with no records kept of minutes or votes, which one expert said was an apparent violation of open meetings laws.

Former County Executive Steve Bellone’s designee at the meetings was Ryan Attard, his chief of staff who also served as committee chair. Newsday previously reported that Attard in January was named chief operating officer of the Family & Children’s Association, a nonprofit that received two grants totaling $1.8 million. Attard’s appointment at FCA noted she developed the process for applying for and administering the grants.

Responding to the audit, Jeffrey Reynolds, president and chief executive of the Family & Children's Association, said: “As the opioid crisis continues to impact Suffolk residents, we are putting these funds to good use saving lives and, of course, welcome any efforts to speed up the distribution of opioid settlement dollars into communities that sorely need the services.”

Family & Children’s Association spokeswoman Kim Como has said Attard was appointed to the job a month after she left as deputy county executive and nearly a year after the committee decided on award recipients.

Como told Newsday last month that Attard “will be recusing herself from any subsequent funding that we apply for from Suffolk County.” Como said the FCA has “engaged council to review internal policy and the county laws to ensure we’re avoiding any conflict of interest.” 

Reynolds has said it’s “not at all uncommon for people leaving government to look to continue their public service in the nonprofit sector — and quite frankly, that should be celebrated, not criticized.”

Newsday previously reported that Suffolk County Executive Ed Romaine has ordered a “thorough review of the opioid grant application and consideration process.”

Despite awarding $57 million in grants, Suffolk County records show that only about $2.3 million has been paid out to agencies that were awarded funding in 2022 and 2023. The second-largest payout thus far was to the Family & Children’s Association, which last year received $312,995 out of their $1.8 million award, second only to the $318,690 received by Outreach Development Corp.

“I’ve directed staff that not a single payment goes out unless I see it first. Once we start an audit, that gives any submission [for payment] a higher degree of scrutiny,” Kennedy said.

Kennedy said the audit will look at whether the county advanced money to agencies prior to services rendered, which he called “unheard of,” and the wording of the contracts. “I’ve heard that some of the description and contents of some of the contracts have been extremely vague and poorly defined,” he said.

He’ll also look at “how the money is being used, what are the agencies doing with it and is it actually achieving the goal of the litigation” in terms of education and treatment.

Kevin McCaffrey, the county legislature’s presiding officer, served on the committee. He said there were no minutes or recorded votes because legislative counsel William Duffy advised him that they were not necessary.

Duffy did not respond to requests for comment.

McCaffrey said the Suffolk County Health Department reviewed the applications and made funding recommendations. He said the committee didn’t always follow its recommendations.

“We were looking at it in a different way,” he said. “We picked some new, innovative programs that didn’t have a track record.”

Jon Kaiman, a former Suffolk deputy county executive, said he did not request an ethics opinion on whether the committee was required to record minutes or votes. He said he forwarded a previous opinion to “folks engaging on this issue to give them the legal context within which the opioid committee was operating.”

The opinion from the New York State Department of State said that generally, “ad hoc entities consisting of persons other than members of public bodies having no power to take final action fall outside the scope of the Open Meetings Law.”

Paul Sabatino, former legislative counsel and an expert on municipal law, said that opinion does not apply to the opioid committee because it was not purely advisory.

“This is a statutory committee that had the power to set the terms and conditions of legally binding contracts that determined the disbursement of the funds. As such, it was subject to the Open Meetings Law,” he said.