📝DRAFT

To the Hickman County Commission, the Opioid Board, and neighbors. September 3, 2026

I am writing as a Hickman County resident about the request to put Opioid Settlement money into a United Way Prevention Coalition staff position. I am asking you to reject that request.

Prevention matters and kids matter. This money was paid because families in counties like ours were harmed by opioids. That is why it should not be spent on somewhat self-directed work from home position that makes accountability/outcomes difficult to assess and measure. The plan mainly describes handing out papers in buildings full of staff who can easily hand out papers.

Who is asking, and what they already have

The applicant is United Way of Greater Nashville, legally United Way of Middle Tennessee, Inc. Public filings show an organization with tens of millions of dollars moving through it every year. In calendar 2024 it reported about $46.2 million in revenue, about $46.5 million in expenses, and about $70 million in total assets, including roughly $45 million in investments and $11 million in cash. Recent listings put the staff in the range of 100 to 140 people. These are public numbers.

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It is difficult to justify that an organization of this size and wealth of the United Way refuses to commit to hiring someone for the open position (see the transcript below) and guarantees that person a salary unless a small county first guarantees to fund that position. What do we need the United Way for? We could do this ourselves!

A $30,000 request looks modest until you set it next to that balance sheet, and next to the $60,000 this county gave them last year. United Way’s own Hickman highlight sheet called that earlier award a one-time $60,000 opioid-abatement grant to stand up a coalition and hire a director. This year’s paperwork came back asking $30,000, with about $10,000 marked for a part-time prevention post, in the hope that some other grant would fill the rest.

If another grant never arrives, the county is left holding a half-built position (one that does not need to exist in the first place). If it does arrive, we will have used local settlement money as seed capital for a large Nashville organization to raise still more money. That is not a small point. At the July 14, 2026 Opioid Board meeting, it was said that the prior worker spent the last months of the grant applying for more grants. I do not believe that is what Hickman County’s share of this settlement was meant to buy.

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Using grant funds to hire someone who is then using those funds to raise more funds is not allowed under the guidelines of the funds as far as I am aware. United Way should be rejected on this violation alone or at least told to come back next year with a better plan.

What the last go-around produced

I personally attended the July meeting recorded it. https://hickman-county-unofficial.com/view/137 Approval was deferred so the application could be cleaned up. That was the right thing to do. The application on the table still carried 2025 dates and named a project lead, who had already stepped away for personal reasons. The post was unfilled. The board was told it is hard to hire without guaranteed salary. That may be true. It is also true that a funding body should not be asked to pony up county money so that a third party can then fill that position.

When members asked what the work looks like on the ground, the answers were these: goes to the schools, goes to county events, hands out boxes, hands out information about drug prevention. She was making great strides. She was going to the schools. No counts. No schools named with dates. No number of students reached. No before-and-after measure. No report of hours on prevention versus hours on fundraising.

A website was offered as proof of infrastructure.

hpc-tn.org

It is a short page on inexpensive hosting. It states a mission, points to the Sheriff’s drug drop box, and invites partners through a contact form. There is no local phone where a parent can call and reach a Hickman County person. There is no calendar of school visits. There is no list of results. Teenagers and elementary students, or anyone else for that matter, are not going to that site. We should not be using funds allocated for the benefit of the citizens of Hickman County to build websites that are outdated the day they start.

We are already paying for this work inside the schools

The opioid board has already allocated $165,000 for behavioral-health work in the Hickman County school system. After that action the available balance discussed in July was about $58,000, with more expected back from unused school and United Way funds. Teachers, counselors, bus drivers, cafeteria staff, assistants, and now the behavioral-health team already walk the same halls this grant would walk. If the product is flyers, hotline numbers, bracelets, and resource boxes, the school system already has the people and the buildings to accomplish this task and any position that would do this is redundant and wasteful.

A better use of the same dollars

The school system is partnering with District Solutions LLC to put banners on county buses for 2026–2027, with a planned debut around October 2026. Two signs per bus, up to 36 by 90 inches. Tobacco, alcohol, politics, and certain foods are barred. Revenue is split 55 percent to Hickman County Schools and 45 percent to the vendor. That program will roll whether we use it well or not.

It is a more effective idea to put the prevention messages on the buses. A short line such as Hickman Cares or Hickman Strong. Every morning and afternoon those buses pass the same children this grant claims it will reach. No work from home office. No second website. No hope that a teenager will type hpc-tn.org into a phone or visit an obscure Facebook page.

If the opioid board wants to spend on the order of $30,000, let it buy that first year of prevention space as the public sponsor. Under the agreement already in hand, more than half of the paid placement returns directly to the school system. The county keeps the message, the schools keep a share of the cash, and the public can literally see the results.

The rest is simple and inexpensive. One page on the county website with the same numbers. A domain that points to that page. Teachers and drivers can still hand out cards, papers, and bracelets.

What I am asking

Do not approve the United Way Prevention Coalition staff request.
Let the incoming mayor and the new commissioners review this proposal and let’s get it put into action using existing county resources.
Request the school board price a first-year prevention banner on the school buses and a single county webpage, and to compare that cost and that reach against another year of an unfilled coalition post. Let a team of students design the graphics and put the skill on their future resumes!
Require every grant from this fund to include a public report on hours, tasks, and results, updated at least monthly. If public money pays for the work, the public should be able to see what is being done.

Respectfully, Ethan Post Hickman County, Tennessee