In the News
Deseret News reported that Gov. Spencer Cox signed an executive order Monday, making Utah the first state to adopt the Trump administration’s Great American Recovery Initiative. The order creates a Recovery Utah Initiative Council with a seat for the faith community, invites private groups and nonprofits to partner, and sets goals to cut drug deaths and homelessness after release from custody by 25%.
Here’s Our Take
We welcome a plan that treats churches and private groups as recovery partners. They offer what a government agency can’t, such as mentors, belonging, and a reason to stay sober. The Other Side Academy, The Other Side Village, and John Volken Academy put residents to work and hold them accountable through peer support. That combination builds the work history and foundational habits people need for a stable life. The state helps most when it removes the barriers that keep people from these programs and then steps back. Churches and neighbors cared for the addicted and the homeless long before the state took on the job, and they remain better suited to it.
State data shows 77% of Utah’s most-arrested people are homeless. Release too often leads back to the street and another arrest. Libertas Institute is partnering with private programs like these to expand access and capacity, so they become trusted alternatives to incarceration and a standard landing place for people leaving jail and prison. The more room Utah makes for private recovery, the fewer people will cycle back through its courts and shelters.
