June 22, 2026: Let’s Talk About…The Impacts of Federal Funding Cuts with Regina LaBelle provides an in-depth discussion about the downstream impacts of potential Medicaid cuts on SAMHSA Block Grant funding, state budgets, and opioid settlement dollars.

About Regina: Regina LaBelle, JD, is a nationally recognized leader in addiction policy. She served as Acting Director of The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) during the Biden Administration. Regina also served as an appointee in the Obama Administration where she oversaw the nation’s response to the opioid epidemic at ONDCP. Regina is the founder and director of the Center on Addiction and Public Policy at The O’Neill Institute at Georgetown Law. She also founded, directs and is a professor in the Master of Science in Addiction Policy and Practice program in Georgetown’s School of Health. The unique one-year program seeks to build an addiction policy field that is rooted in science and evidence, and driven by compassion.

June 8, 2026: Let’s Talk About… The Future of Peer Work with Chad Sabora explores how certification standards and recovery requirements can be reimagined to better include those with lived experience.

About Chad: Chad Sabora, BA, MS, JD is a leading voice in harm reduction and drug policy reform, integrating lived experience with legal training, behavioral science and direct community practice. He holds degrees in psychology and political science, earned a law degree and previously served as a prosecuting attorney in Chicago. For more than a decade, he has worked across law, health care, public policy and community-based services to modernize the response to drug use. In Missouri, Illinois and Washington, D.C., he helped write, advocate for and pass reforms including overdose Good Samaritan protections, first responder and third-party naloxone access, and safeguards preventing the criminal justice system from interfering with evidence-based medications for opioid use disorder, including methadone and buprenorphine. He served on SAMHSA’s harm reduction stakeholder group, which authored the federal Harm Reduction Framework. He has advised the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy on harm reduction and recovery strategy and has served as a subject matter expert to the National Council for Mental Wellbeing and HHS’s Equity Technical Assistance Center. He was a senior advisor to Faces & Voices of Recovery and collaborated with NIDA on work to improve outcomes for people involved in the criminal justice system. Chad currently works with Unity Recovery as an advisor and subject matter expert. His work has been featured on the front page of The New York Times and by CNN, MSNBC and NBC News, where he was the focus of an Emmy Award-winning segment.

September 20, 2024: Let’s Talk About…The Wounded Approach to Wound Care in New Jersey explores the barriers faced by individuals seeking medical care for substance use–related wounds and highlights New Jersey’s efforts to revise regulations and licensing to support more integrated, patient-centered care.

Presented by NCAAR in partnership with:

• Dr. Alexis LaPietra from RWJBarnabas Institute for Prevention and Recovery
• Mike Santillo from Prevention Links and the New Jersey Coalition for Addiction Recovery Support (NJ-CARS).

May 7, 2024: Let’s Talk About…Fentanyl Awareness Day features a panel discussion exploring the silos between prevention, family education, and recovery communities, and highlights the need for a more coordinated, multi-faceted approach to addressing the fentanyl crisis.

Presented by NCAAR in partnership with:

• Governor’s Council on Substance Use Disorder
• Fred Muench, PhD, Former President of Partnership to End Addiction
• Partnership for a Drug-Free New Jersey
• Song for Charlie