City of Stone Mountain seal on the historic railroad depot. Photo by Dean Hesse.
By Jaedon Mason, contributor
Stone Mountain, GA — The Stone Mountain City Council voted at its April 4 meeting to participate in the 2022 National Opioid Settlement.
It’s unclear how much money the city would receive from participating in the settlement.
At the end of 2022 a second round of settlements was reached.
This 2022 settlement was reached between local and state litigators, 3 Pharmacy chains – CVS, Walgreens and Walmart- and 2 manufacturers – Allergan and Teva. The agreement is as follows:
— Teva to pay up to $3.34 billion over 13 years and to provide either $1.2 billion of its generic version of the drug Narcan over 10 years or $240 million of cash in lieu of product, as each state may elect;
— Allergan to pay up to $2.02 billion over 7 years;
— CVS to pay up to $4.90 billion over 10 years;
— Walgreens to pay up to $5.52 billion over 15 years; and
— Walmart to pay up to $2.74 billion in 2023, and all payments to be made within 6 years.
This is an “opt-in” settlement, which means the participation process for the city will be purely administrative. Agreeing to “opt-in” won’t mean the city will be asked to defend or settle claims.
“The more participation these settlements get from local governments, the more money will be available in the pot to spread back out” says City Attorney Jeff Strickland.
“There’s the possibility the city could get money out of it at some point in the future,” Strickland added, clarifying that this money would be untaxed, when answering a question from Mayor Dr. Beverly Jones.
Considering the upcoming deadline to “opt-in” on April 18, the council voted unanimously to participate.
In other news:
— The Council voted to approve the Request for Qualifications list of four firms: Wood Engineering, Prime Engineering, CTI Engineering and CPL. Each firm will be in the pool for two years since their purview will primarily be long term construction projects.
— The council voted to approve the first in an upcoming series of GMA City of Ethics resolutions.
— The city secured a contractor for surveying the sinkholes on Rockborough Road and McCurdy Park. The dates for the survey are April 13 for Rockborough and April 14 for McCurdy.
— The city’s beautification initiative is set to start May 13th and along with a citywide cleanup May 6. Both events are seeking volunteers, so to volunteer email [email protected]
Read the original story on Decaturish.com.
