Nine Southeast Alaska communities are getting naloxone vending machines

Naloxone is going into vending machines and emergency cabinets in nine Southeast Alaska communities you can reach only by boat or plane. The Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska won $895,401 from the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration to put it there. None of the sites exist yet. The grant period opens Sept. 30.

The nine are Juneau, Angoon, Kake, Klukwan, Saxman, Thorne Bay, Hydaburg, Klawock and Kasaan. Over five years the tribe plans to hand out 5,000 naloxone kits, train 250 people to recognize an overdose and hold at least 160 prevention events, with sites in all nine communities by year three. It estimates reaching 5,000 people with prevention services and 6,000 with overdose or infectious disease prevention.

Alaska recorded 339 overdose deaths in 2024. About 73 percent involved fentanyl, roughly 247 people.

The tribe asked for $3.75 million for the five-year project and received $895,401, under a quarter of it.

The grant does not pay for treatment. People who need it are connected through what the tribe calls warm hand-off agreements, meaning a partner organization takes the person on rather than handing over a phone number. Eight regional organizations are involved, among them the Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium, Bartlett Regional Hospital, JAMHI Health & Wellness and the Juneau School District.

A second award from the same agency, $1,318,154 over three years, funds a project called Lightkeepers. It extends the tribe's Community and Behavioral Services Healing Center into Washington's Puget Sound region, where about 8,000 Tlingit and Haida citizens live, adding outpatient behavioral health services, crisis intervention and suicide risk assessment, along with formal partnerships with Washington 988 providers and stronger 988 connections across Southeast Alaska. It also expands When Cedar Touches Water, the tribe's model for supporting a community after a suicide or an attempt.

Tlingit and Haida represents more than 38,000 citizens and organizes in Southeast Alaska through 19 community council chapters. The two awards together come to $2,213,555, two of six the agency made to Alaska organizations this round totaling $5.79 million. Douglas Indian Association, also in Southeast, received $349,999.

Anyone in crisis can reach the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by call or text.