For decades, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) has invested in organizations led by people with psychiatric histories and other forms of first-hand experience with trauma, substance use, incarceration, and other life-interrupting challenges. Through national technical assistance centers, these organizations have fostered budding peer-run groups across the country by providing training, consultation, leadership development, and resources grounded in the knowledge that comes from having “been there.”
Current awardees include the National Empowerment Center, the Copeland Center for Wellness and Recovery, Youth MOVE National, Peer Support Coalition of Florida, and RI International.
This year, however, SAMHSA made a significant change.
For the first time in 30 years, eligibility for the national Consumer and Consumer Support Technical Assistance Center (C-TAC) is no longer limited to organizations that require leadership to have that experience. Instead, a much broader range of nonprofit organizations may now apply. SAMHSA also appears to be combining the budgets allotted to five different awardees into one single, larger award.
At first glance, these may seem like routine grant changes, but they raise bigger questions. Eligibility criteria determine not only who can receive funding, but also whose knowledge and leadership are recognized as essential to shaping supports.
The organizations that grew out of psychiatric survivor and related leadership were never simply ‘service providers’, and their predecessors weren’t focused on delivering ‘services’ at all. They emerged from people organizing for dignity, human rights, self-determination, liberty, mutual support, and a meaningful voice in decisions affecting their lives. They fought against force, discrimination and the sorts of extreme power imbalances that continue to exist between those labeled “sane” and those deemed not. Those values continue to shape many such organizations today.
Technical assistance influences far more than training. It helps shape leadership, develop resources, highlight emerging ideas, and strengthen organizations across the country. The organization selected for this grant will help influence those efforts for years to come.
SAMHSA has not publicly explained why it changed this longstanding eligibility requirement. That leaves many organizations asking:
- What happens to knowledge born from collective experience, organizing, and mutual support if organizations without those histories are placed at the helm?
- Could this contract now be awarded to an organization that historically has been pro-force and/or previously unsupportive of the concept of peer support?
- Why was this change made?
- What does it signify about support for systems change and leadership priorities overall?
- How will people with psychiatric and related histories continue to shape national technical assistance?
Reducing five awards to one also raises questions about sustainability. Concentrating funding in a single organization may reduce pathways to long-term sustainability for peer-run organizations overall by increasing competition for limited resources rather than fostering collaboration. It may also narrow the range of expertise, perspectives, and cultural relevance represented in national technical assistance by narrowing the number of groups involved.
This moment also invites broader reflection on how the increasing industrialization of peer support (i.e., turning a movement into a workforce) has influenced the values, priorities, and aspirations of the movements that gave rise to it.
Roots Up recently joined organizations across the country in signing a letter expressing concern about this change. You can read that letter here.
Applications for this contract were due on July 31, but any award decisions are still in progress. If this issue matters to you, we encourage you to learn more and consider sharing your perspective with SAMHSA. Personal stories about why leadership from people who’ve “been there” matters can help demonstrate what is at stake.
We don’t yet know what this change will ultimately mean. What we do know is that decisions about who leads national technical assistance will influence organizations, leaders, and communities across the country for years to come.
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