Neill Miner, former Director of the New England Institute for Addiction Studies, discusses the challenges of time limitations.

“I think it’s very challenging for any state if there isn’t any statewide overseeing board that makes decisions and I think it’s really challenging when it’s an issue that’s still not really very well known.”

Lauri Roberts, former RI Task Force Coordinator

Beginning to Mobilize | Recipe for Success | Challenges | What We Learned

Organizing the States: Challenges

We faced the challenges that all task forces may, such as membership, momentum, time and resources. In addition, buy-in, endorsements, and support from key staff in state government were very significant contributors to the success of our state efforts. After all, we were asking states to make changes to their own systems as they saw fit. Some of our states found it advantageous to gather grass roots support for inhalant prevention initiatives first, needing to convince policy makers of the urgency of the problem and the cost-benefits of the solutions offered.