GREENFIELD — On the surface, the face of the region’s deepening addiction crisis is the rising toll of overdose deaths, but the epidemic’s effects ripple farther, into the lives of the young children the victims sometimes leave behind.
Other times, a parent’s substance abuse problem finds them entangled in the court system, facing the loss of custody of their children.
Often, the responsibility to care for those children falls on their grandparents or another relative. Cases like that have spiked 50 percent since 2010.
In a effort to help buck that trend, the state Attorney General’s Office and the Commission on the Status of Grandparents Raising Grandchildren will host a town hall forum at Greenfield Community College Oct. 17 to discuss the issue.
The forum starts at 5:30 p.m.
“With the rapid rise in opioid use and opioid-related deaths in recent years, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of grandparent and kinship caregivers stepping up to raise children who have been impacted by this crisis,” the AG’s office noted in a press release.
The forum will give grandparents and caregivers the chance to speak about how opioid and other substanse abuse has impacted their family and the children they’re now raising. The AG’s office and the commission will also provide information and resources about how their offices work to support caregivers.
The event will include presentations from the AG’s office and the commission, and staff from local resource centers will be on hand to meet with attendees.
You can reach Tom Relihan
at: 413-772-0261, ext. 264
or trelihan@recorder.com