Lisa Poggi

I just got home from downtown Los Angeles, where I spent the day with my brother. The traffic-filled ride home took nearly an hour and forty minutes, and I spent most of that time crying. Downtown Los Angeles triggers me. I see mentally ill, drug-addicted people sleeping on sidewalks, in doorways, and doing drugs, while regular people walk past or around them. This isn’t even Skid Row. I have been to Skid Row looking for my son. It was a traumatic experience I wouldn’t wish on anyone. My son...

The Great American Recovery Initiative Misses the Mark The first batch of funding released under the Great American Recovery Initiative has been framed as a bold shift in America’s response to substance use disorder. At Prevention Day, the largest government sponsored gathering dedicated to advancing substance use prevention and hosted by Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced a $100 million investment intended to correct what he described...

Bill Williams with his son William Recently, I was discussing the substance use epidemic with a friend who works in addiction advocacy. We were talking about the obstacles, hurdles, and pitfalls my son William encountered in his struggle with and eventual death from heroin. In a flippant moment, I described his experience and that of many like him as a game of “Chutes and Ladders” where the board only contained chutes. That remark is, in fact, my dismal assessment of the possibility of...