LEXINGTON, Ky. (LEX 18) — This summer, Lexington reported a summer spike in non-fatal drug overdoses. Wednesday’s overdose alert is a timely topic because the Kentucky Public Health is Public Safety tour stopped in Lexington on Wednesday.
State campaign coordinator for dream.org, John Bowman, shared that his goal is to close prison doors and open doors of opportunity.
“Life gets better,” Bowman said. “You can do amazing things even if you have a bad past. It doesn’t matter what our past is, we can always make a brighter future.”
For 24 years, Bowman suffered from substance use disorder and was incarcerated on multiple occasions. Now, he’s six years into recovery, using those past experiences to help other Kentuckians.
“It’s the same everywhere,” Bowman shared of the drug problems. “It’s no different from one community to the other. You know the people might be a little different but the issues are the same.”
The Public Health is Public Safety Tour brings community leaders from different perspectives together, showing how they each advocate for the same changes.
“We bring a lot of unlikely allies together,” Bowman shared. “It’s really cool to see and it’s really good to see people that normally wouldn’t mix end up coming with the same kind of solution to an issue.”
“When you’re hearing someone who’s in recovery and a law enforcement officer both come to the realization that we need more resources, or we need more treatment beds, or we need deflection, and you hear that organically, it really, it makes your heart smile.”
Amanda Hall, senior director of national campaigns for dream.org, has also noticed the impact of bringing these perspectives together.
“I’ve really seen power come from those groups really bridging that gap and coming together to talk about the issue they see, but to also talk about how we can work together to provide solutions,” Hall said.
During a panel discussion at the start of the meeting, the discussions looked something like this:
“At the end of the day it’s really about being a supportive employer,” said Ryan Bowman the program manager of the Workforce Recovery Program at Kentucky Chamber of Commerce.
“Harm reduction is meeting people where they’re,” said Stephanie Johnson, the statewide coordinator for VOCAL Kentucky.
“In 2017 there was 78,000 Americans overdosed, right, in the United States, and my daughter was one of those,” Andrew Hager, the founder of the Blameless Children shared.
Lexington firefighter and paramedic said, “paramedics or police officers and people in my profession often get frustrated and we’re often not frustrated with the person, we’re frustrated with the fact that there’s not a solution.”
The Public Health Public Safety Tour got its start here in Kentucky last year, but it’s been so successful that Dream.org has decided to take the campaign nationwide.
“We believe that everyone is impacted by overdose deaths,” Hall said. “Since it impacts everyone, we want everyone to try to fight to make some changes.”
Lexington was scheduled to be the last stop, but now the tour has added one final event in Louisville on September 25.
“We don’t need to create more problems, we really need to come together and find solutions, and that’s what these events really do,” Bowman said.
