Hamilton City Council is expected to follow suit tonight , by passing a resolution accepting the settlement agreement with Teva, Allergen, CVS, Walgreens and Walmart.
“It is the intent of the parties that all payments disbursed from the settlement funds be used for opioid remediation in our jurisdiction,” said Fairfield City Manager Scott Timmer. “Final budgetary approval would reside with City Council through the appropriation process. "
These are the latest Butler County communities to agree to the settlement payouts with the pharmacy companies. Many have already accepted the terms, but Fairfield, a city with nearly 45,000 residents, is one of two communities reporting how much it could receive.
Hamilton, the county’s capital seat, with more than 63,000 residents, will have its City Council consider the resolution at tonight’s meeting. They expect to receive more than $1.3 million from the five pharmacy companies in various installments.
“The city of Hamilton filed a lawsuit against those entities who have helped to create and sustain the crisis seeking to hold them accountable for the damage caused by their misconduct, negligence, and exploitation,” according to a staff report by Hamilton Law Director Letitis Block. “As a result of the city, the state of Ohio, and other local governments having a common desire to alleviate the impact caused by manufacturers and distributors, the One Ohio Memorandum of Understanding was drafted with input from potentially joining governments.”
These funds are not related to the OneOhio opioid settlement, which is a different multi-billion dollar agreement with pharmaceutical makers. Many communities have begun receiving payments from this settlement.
Local governments will receive funds from one settlement or another related to the opioid epidemic over the next 18 years.
These lawsuits, including the one with the pharmacies, are a direct result of the opioid crisis, as these local governments claim in the suits that they and their citizens have suffered for years with the adverse consequences of the drug epidemic, such as deaths of community members, the strain on resources, and added costs related to public safety and public health responses.
Teva, Allergen, CVS, Walgreens and Walmart each have a set time to pay the funds to the local communities over varying timeframes. The proposed settlements, assuming there would be 100% participation, could pay out $20 billion to local governments. The proposed settlements also include mandatory changes in corporate behavior to address the issues raised in the litigation.
Local governments who are part of this lawsuit have until Tuesday to accept the terms of the settlement, which calls for money to be used for the abatement of the opioid epidemic and the prevention of future addiction and substance abuse. According to the agreement, funding can be used for past expenditures as long as it meets the requirements.
Ohio is set to receive $808 million in its share. An amount was unknown when Butler County agreed to the settlement, but it has received some of the payments awarded in opioid lawsuits with pharmaceutical companies. The county also agreed to a one-time $149,549 settlement with Meijer.
The city of Oxford accepted the settlement agreement in February. The community has started receiving payments from pharmaceutical companies but has not reported how much it expects to receive from the pharmacies.
Other communities, including Middletown, Monroe and Liberty Twp., have also accepted the settlement agreement with Teva, Allergen, CVS, Walgreens and Walmart, and have begun receiving payments from the other opioid lawsuit settlement.
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