Tumwater City Council agrees to pool opioid settlement funds with partner jurisdictions 

The Tumwater City Council agreed to pool the city’s opioid settlement funds with neighboring jurisdictions to support Thurston County’s Opioid Abatement Council (OAC). 

The city council granted a funding request from staff and Council member Leatta Dahlhoff, who represents the city on the OAC, at a meeting on Monday, Nov. 3. 

Jurisdictions across the country have been pursuing legal action against companies involved in the opioid distribution chain, leading to a series of nationwide and state-level settlements.

Tumwater benefits from those settlements as a signee of the One Washington Memorandum of Understanding, which allows local governments to share in the funds even if they were not original parties to the lawsuits. 

The city agreed to pool the full amount of money it has already received and is expected to get through 2027.  

City Administrator Lisa Parks said the amount would be $461,833, made up of $365,805 already in hand, an expected $49,979 in 2026 and $46,049 anticipated for 2027. 

Dahlhoff explained at a previous city council meeting that the funds would be used to hire service providers who would build infrastructure for implementing opioid prevention projects. 

Dahlhoff explained the OAC lacks the capacity and staffing to pursue such projects by itself. 

The OAC was scheduled to meet on Wednesday, Nov. 5, where representatives of other jurisdictions were expected to share whether they were willing to pool the funds. 

If the OAC moves forward with the plan, it would need to amend an interlocal agreement establishing the organization to permit the pooling of funds. 

Parks said the amended agreement would be presented to the cities by the end of the year or early next year. 

She added the city council’s decision to allow the pooling of funds is just guidance for the time being. The council would have to make a formal mid-biennial budget amendment next year to authorize the use of the funds.