President Donald Trump’s administration has abruptly terminated millions of dollars in substance abuse and mental health treatment grants to the city of Lexington and area nonprofits.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, or SAMHSA, sent a letter to Lexington-Faytete Urban County Government notifying the city it was terminating a $499,000 grant, which was to provide up to 8,000 doses of Narcan, a brand name for naloxone, which can reverse drug overdoses.
Of those 8,000 doses, 3,000 were to be given to Lexington police and fire officials, who carry the overdose reversal drug. The remaining 5,000 Narcan doses were to be distributed throughout the community to groups such as sober living homes, faith organizations and other social service providers, city officials said.
The city was going to hire a part-time person to help distribute Narcan, but those plans are now on hold due to the termination of the grant, which was awarded in October.
The city has received SAMHSA grants since 2022, city officials said. A full-time staff person who manages the grant is currently still employed, but that may change if the grant funding is not restored, said Charlie Lanter, the city’s commissioner of housing advocacy and community development.
Lexington police and fire have enough Narcan on hand as of Jan. 14, said Tyler Scott, chief of staff for Mayor Linda Gorton.
There are other revenue sources to purchase Narcan that have been used by other community groups, Lanter said. But the loss of the grant means 8,000 fewer Narcan doses on the streets, he said.
That could result in a loss of life, he said.
Narcan is added to a hygiene and necessity bag at the Recovery Cafe in Lexington, Ky., on Friday, April 18, 2025. Nearly 200 bags were prepared and distributed during Lexington Community Partner Street Outreach Day.
Scott said the city is weighing how it will pay for those Narcan doses, particularly for police and fire, in the future, he said.
The termination of the funding was effective Jan. 13, according to the letter of termination provided to the Herald-Leader.
Drug treatment program for parenting, pregnant women cut
Other Lexington organizations who received SAMHSA termination letters include Chrysalis House, the Hope Center and Community Action Council, city officials said.
The loss of funding just to Lexington programs is in the millions, city officials said, though the exact total across all the affected organizations was not immediately available.
Chris Peck, a spokesman for the Hope Center, said since the termination of the grant was so abrupt, the Lexington-based homeless and substance abuse treatment program is still trying to determine the effects of the loss of the grant. Peck said the group hopes to release more information Jan. 15.
Community Action Council received a $2.5 million five-year SAMHSA grant for a program that connects homeless people with substance abuse and mental health treatment in a 13-county area, including Fayette County. It was three months into the third year of that grant when Community Action Council was notified of the termination Jan. 13, said Melissa Tibbs, director of the office of sustainability for the anti-poverty group.
That means it will lose a little more than $1 million in federal grant funding.
“Together with Bluegrass Community Action Partnership, we provide housing supports and case management to participants and link them with behavioral health and substance use treatment through community-based partners like New Vista,” Tibbs said. New Vista is the area’s community mental health agency.
The program was entirely funded through the SAMHSA grant, Tibbs said. It had served 85 individuals over the past two years.
“This means we have to end our services,” Tibbs said. “We have informed our program partners and are working to understand the impact on the staff who work under this project.”
The Cabinet for Health and Family Services, which oversees substance abuse treatment and mental health services in Kentucky, said it hopes to have more information later Wednesday on other possible SAMHSA cuts, a spokeswoman said.
Chrysalis House, which provides residential substance abuse and other treatment for pregnant and parenting women, lost a $1 million in funding overnight, said Kama Orr, executive director of Chrysalis House, which is based in Lexington.
“It will immediately and seriously impact the continuity of care that we provide,” Orr said.
The organization received a five-year grant from SAMHSA. It still had a year and nine months left on that grant for a loss of $1 million. That federal money paid for doctors, nurses as well as food and housing costs, Orr said.
Orr was stunned to receive the notification Jan. 13. She’s not sure how the agency, with a $5 million budget, will survive without the federal funding, which it has received since 2004. The nonprofit has reserves it can immediately tap, but those reserves will not last forever, she said.
It’s also not clear why some programs and agencies were cut, Lanter said. Other agencies with SAMHSA grants were not terminated, he said.
The cuts to Chrysalis House will hurt a very vulnerable population, Orr said.
“This is cutting services to pregnant and parenting women and their children,” Orr said. “Chrysalis House has been providing this service for 48 years. “
Nationwide cuts could top $2 billion
In its termination letter SAMHSA officials said the agency that oversees and funds substance abuse and mental health treatment is switching its priorities to focus “on promoting innovative programs and interventions that address the rising rates of mental illness and substance abuse conditions, overdose, and suicide and their connections to chronic diseases, homelessness, and other challenges.”
Lanter and others said Trump officials in other agencies have often given the city and other grant recipients a heads up if there are possible changes or problems with a grant. The city or nonprofits can make changes before the grant was terminated.
That was not the case with the SAMHSA grants, Lanter said.
Hundreds of similar termination letters were sent to agencies and local governments across the country, according to media reports.
The National Alliance on Mental Illness, a nationwide advocacy group that pushes for better mental health treatment, said early estimates show those cuts could total $2 billion across the country.
“These cuts are disheartening and cruel, and they threaten the life-saving work of hundreds of organizations that provide critical mental health support across the United States,” said Daniel H. Gillison, Jr., NAMI’s chief executive officer. “Addressing our mental health and substance use crises in this country has never been political, which is why it continues to have bipartisan support in Congress.”
