April 15, 2026 · Addiction and Community Revitalization Committee · 1,870 words · 9 speakers · 24 segments
Afternoon. I'm calling the Addiction and Community Revitalization Committee to order. And do we have a quorum? So, Clerk, if you'll please call the roll.
Chair Landis.
Here.
Vice Chair Johnson.
Here.
Ranking Member Blackshear.
Here.
Senator Katrona.
Here.
Senator Manning.
Here.
Senator Weinstein.
Here. We do have a quorum. Members, copies of the minutes from the March 24, 2026 meeting of the committee are on your iPads. The question is, shall the minutes from the March 24th meeting be agreed to? Without objection, the minutes are agreed to. At this time, I'd like to call House Bill 58 for its second hearing, proponent testimony, create recovery housing residents' certificate of need program, and first I'd like to call Scotty Powell with Scioto County to provide proponent testimony. Mr. Powell, welcome to committee, and you may proceed.
Thank you, Chair Landis, Vice Chair Johnson, Ranking Member Blackshear, members of the Addiction and Community Revivalization Community. Thank you for the opportunity to provide proponent testimony for House Bill 58. This legislation provides a much-needed framework operating recovery housing that ensures local communities can enforce and feel confident that quality standards are maintained and providing a much-needed care to some of our most vulnerable population. My name is Scotty Powell. I am the chairman of the board for the Cytoc County Commissioners, and when I joined the Commissioner's Board in January of 2021, the number one question I received was, what are you going to do about all these recovery houses? As I stand here today, this is still the number one question I am presented with by members of our community. For some background, Cytoc County, and our county seat, Portsmouth, Ohio, is often used as the poster child for the opioid epidemic, which makes it fitting that Representative Pizzouli is one of the sponsors of this bill, and Senator Terry Johnson is a sponsor of Senate Bill 138, which is the foundation on which this bill can be built upon. Our community was one of the first hit with the illegal pill mills. Once again, Senator Johnson was there to help shut down those responsible for spreading this poison across our communities. There have been books written about Portsmouth, national news segments aired, and many national articles written about how opioids ravished my hometown. I'm pleased to say those darker days are behind us. and our community is seeing a revitalization of historic investments in our community and economic development. Now with that said Scioto County is the benchmark for how an unregulated recovery industry can contribute to strains on the public safety housing crisis and homelessness We were the first to experience the pill mills and by default we are ahead of the curve for the rest of the state on how recovery should and should not look I could share many local stories of how this unregulated industry has negatively impacted our neighbors, our communities, and even the very people that they are set up to serve. but I want to share a different perspective at this time since Representative Pizzouli did a great job sharing some of those stories during his testimony. Now at the local level we have attempted to find ways to mitigate some of the risks associated with recovery housing. During a public hearing regarding possible zoning in the city of Portsmouth, one statement hit me like a ton of bricks. On one side of the discussion we had community members who were concerned for their safety, their property, their neighbors and neighborhoods and on the recovery side of the the statement that I heard that hit home was we are health care you wouldn't treat any other segment of health care this way now this was profound for me because you see the most public part of my life is that of a county commissioner but my career is that of a health care executive I have been a licensed nursing home administrator for 15 years I have an oversight with assisted living communities nursing homes home health hospice and I'm currently the director of operations for a hospice organization that covers half the state of Ohio. The problem with the statement, we are health care and you wouldn't treat any other segment of health care this way, is that it was true, but not in the way the speaker meant it. We have been treating recovery differently from other segments. There was no registration process, no real inspection process, and no real way to ensure minimum standards of care were being maintained. And even if they weren't maintained, what was the penalty? To be clear, I am not anti-recovery. In fact, we have arguably some of the best operators in the region, if not in the state of Ohio, in Sayota County. What I am against are low standards, low quality, and a vulnerable population being taken advantage of. In my opinion, the recovery industry is still in its emphasis stage of development and oversight compared to other segments of health care. A perfect example of this is Senate Bill 138, which required the entities to register their recovery houses. Prior to this crucial legislation, we had no real understanding of how many recovery homes were even in our community. Today, we now know that number is well over 100 for a population of roughly 70,000 people. This amount of recovery houses is on par with counties that have a population of over a million. Now while there may be some opponents to these measures the changes are common sense regulations that are in place to protect our valuable population and better ensure that our taxpayer dollars are getting the best return for their investment Empowering our local prosecutors to take action and shut down bad actors is critical in this space. Current legislation relies on many steps that eventually makes its way to the Attorney General's office, which creates delays and slows time frame in which individuals need help. There may be some opponents that think this oversight is enough, however, it only impacts areas in which criminal acts take place and not nuisance, and it disregards below health care standards for dignity and quality of health. When individuals are court-ordered for treatment away from their families, their communities, and their support systems, they need the opportunity to return home. This bill ensures that they have the means by requiring those court systems to pay to bring them home. Too often we have experienced individuals stranded in our community following an unsuccessful treatment attempt this bill correct sat at one point we calculated that roughly 40% of the individuals getting treatment through the Medicaid system in Soda County were not Soda County residents and coming from other areas and finally this bill does strengthen the certification process by placing it in the hands of the state agency and not in the hands of those that actually own and operate recovery housing I recognize there may be some that believe the current regular regulations are enough we just need more time to see it implemented however the first round of regulations was the first step to getting recovery on par with other sectors of health care House Senate bill 138 set forth the requirement to register that act gave us the baseline of who was of knowing who was even operating in the market by supporting House bill 58 you're taking a second step to ensure standard a minimum standard of care and quality and recovery houses you're voting for quality standards to be maintained and experienced by those struggling with addiction. You are powering our local experts to investigate community and consumer concerns and to weed out bad actors, quite honestly dragging down the reputation of the industry. And you are setting up a work group to further review and recommend best practices. Finally, you are helping to protect communities and provide a peace of mind that our taxpayer dollars are being wisely spent on operators that truly have a heart for those in recovery by providing the highest standard of care. I encourage each of you to support House Bill 58. I appreciate the efforts of the bill's sponsors, Representative Pizzouli and Representative Gerrolds, in crafting the legislation. Thank you all for your time today, and I welcome any questions you may have.
Thank you, Mr. Powell, for your testimony. Are there any questions from the committee?
I guess mine's more of a comment than maybe just a small question, maybe. But first of all thank you for your service to the county and with your professional background I think that really adds credence to your testimony I observed your county from a distance through the eyes of former Representative Terry Johnson and now Senator Terry Johnson and working on pill mill regulation back in the day. And I've read the book, and it was a very important book. But this legislation, which I thank you, thank the sponsors for bringing it forward, But this bill, what does it mean to you as a health care professional? Does that increase the opportunity for success in the recovery of those that are addicted with implementation of this bill?
Yeah, thank you for the question. I think it does because it gives us the opportunity. Now, once again, this bill specifically is targeting the bad actors, in my opinion. So once you weed out the bad actors, now people getting recovery can at least know who's good. The problem even still with this bill, and I think eventually more steps are to come, it still doesn't outline what quality is, which I think that is a much further path down the road of what is quality in this sector of health care. I can point to what quality looks like in other sectors of health care. What this bill does is at least take care of the bad actor, so I know when my loved one is going somewhere, it is not subpar standards, similar to the example that Rep. Pizzouli shared during his testimony of animal feces on the floor and doors falling in and overcrowded spaces. So we can at least shut down those areas. And then there's other standards of health care that you start getting more micro when you start looking at data, but at least shuts down the bad actors.
Very good. And again, thank you for your testimony.
Yeah. Thank you, and have a good day.
All right. Appreciate your time.
Thank you.
Okay. Next I'd like to call David Thelman.
Pardon me?
Okay, that's no problem. Is there anyone else here today to testify on House Bill 58? Members also take a look at the written testimony on your iPads. We have testimony from Teresa Lample, Pam Johnson, Katie Brydenball-Wooding, Michael Handrew, and I think that's it. So that will be on there. And we do have the sheriff's testimony also. And we do have the sheriff's testimony also. So that's on there also. So please take a look at that. And this concludes the second hearing on House Bill 58. Is there any other business to become before the committee? Seeing none. We're adjourned.