Campaign for drug treatment, recovery programs unveiled for Westmoreland, eastern Allegheny residents

The U.S. Justice Department on Monday announced a new public campaign to promote local addiction and recovery programs to combat the still climbing numbers of drug overdoses and deaths in Western Pennsylvania.

The Press Play PA program will target Westmoreland County and eastern Allegheny County communities to highlight efforts being undertaken to curb addiction, show current statistics and link residents to services.

“We want to provide hope for those in the throes of addiction from substance abuse disorder. Help is available and that really is our primary message today,” Stephen R. Kaufman, the acting U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania, said during a news conference in Greensburg at the Westmoreland County Courthouse.

Drug overdose deaths had grown steadily in Westmoreland County through much of the 2010s. After a two-year reduction, the numbers started to climb again in 2020. Officials said 123 people died last year of drug overdoses in the county, a 7% increase over the previous year.

Allegheny County saw 22% increase in overdoses last year, when 689 deaths were attributed to drugs.

Kaufman said the $75,000 program created a website, PressPlayPA.com, with links to information, lists of treatment providers and will feature videos promoting the various local efforts to help recovery, including one that focuses on Westmoreland County’s drug court program and another that spotlights Sage’s Army, a local nonprofit that provides recovery services and counseling for addicts and their families.

The campaign will feature advertisements appearing on Port Authority of Allegheny buses, at bus shelters and on a handful of billboards in the region, Kaufman said. Westmoreland County Transit Authority, which hires a local firm to sell ads on its buses, was not asked to participate in the advertising campaign, according to agency director Alan Blahovec.

The program and accompanying media campaign has the full support of Westmoreland officials.

District Attorney John Peck said prosecutors have come to realize that solving the addiction crisis involves more than putting people in jail.

“We should be there, and it’s our obligation to be there and our need to be there for people who seek recovery and seek treatment. Certainly our problem can be solved to some extent by opening the doors to those individuals who are seeking recovery, who are seeking treatment,” Peck said.

Westmoreland County’s drug court started in 2015 and has seen more than 50 people graduate from the two-year program that focuses on treatment and recovery. The first graduation ceremony in more than a year will be held next week at the courthouse.

Several of the county’s drug court graduates are featured in one video on the website, a development that Common Pleas Court Judge Meagan Bilik-DeFazio, one of the two judges who oversee the program, said is a sign that the public’s perception and stigma associated with drug addiction has started to change for the better.

“They’ll tell you drug court saved their lives, but they saved themselves. Our program just provided them with the support they needed along the way,” Bilik-DeFazio said.

“Recovery is possible if you want it. If you want to change, if you want to break free from the chains of addiction and the guilt and shame and the trauma that comes with it the help is out there waiting for you,” she said. “Healing is possible and recovery works. The bravest thing you can do, right now, is reach out and ask for help. I promise you the help is out there.”