Once, Lisa Sprague said the city had shown little interest in her effort to raise awareness about opioid addiction.
Now, the Center Barnstead woman says the event to honor her late brother is receiving the attention it needs to be successful.
The first Heroin Awareness Walk, inspired by a similar event Sprague had participated in last March in Nashua, will be held Saturday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Rollins Park.
Sprague, whose brother John J. O’Brien was 36 when a heroin overdose took his life on May 22, 2015, met with city officials last week to finalize plans. The walk, 1- and 2-mile routes around the park, will be attended by volunteers certified to train participants in the use of Narcan, medication that counteracts an overdose.
As many as 500 Narcan kits will be available for families once they’ve been trained to use it.
“I can tell you,” Sprague said, “that I am pleased with the city of Concord and how it is helping me with the event.”
That wasn’t always the case. Sprague joined an estimated 800 people for a walk two months ago in Nashua. The organizer, Darlene Pina, had been approached in her car by a woman asking for money, and, judging by the woman’s appearance, Pina assumed the woman needed the cash to support her drug habit.
Pina, shocked by what she’d seen, sought to create an awareness walk and convinced the city to co-sponsor the event, a decision approved by its mayor, Jim Donchess. Co-sponsorship meant insurance coverage under the city’s policy. Once Pina showed proof of insurance, no fees were necessary to stage the event.
Inspired, Sprague pushed to host her own event here to honor O’Brien as the one-year anniversary of his death approached. But Sprague expressed concern that city officials showed little passion for her idea, saying they were slow to communicate and declined to waive fees.
The total price tag – insurance, police detail, miscellaneous fees – would have cost $1,400, easily affordable through a small registration fee. But Sprague viewed support from the city, perhaps in the form of a co-sponsorship deal, as symbolically vital, helping to heighten the urgency with which addiction needs to be addressed.
Sprague approached the media hoping to publicize her effort. She believes a local story helped move her idea forward. She paid $81 in initial fees, secured insurance coverage, free of charge, from the Grace Capital Church, and was able to meet with city officials Friday to plan the event.
Sprague said she got a “really good rate” on porta potties and probably won’t need to pay for a police detail if the number of walkers stays put at 400-plus people.
“If we went on any major roads it would have required directing traffic,” Sprague said. “So we’ll stay on the interior of the sidewalk and not cross any major streets. Because of that we don’t need police detail.”
The event has attracted attention from the CEOs of two treatment facilities, one in Florida, the other in California.
Sprague said she hopes Mayor Jim Bouley will attend. Sen. Kelly Ayotte will send a representative, Sprague said, and she hasn’t heard back from Sen. Jeanne Shaheen’s camp.
And although her walk has not received the overall support the Nashua event got, Sprague said she’s grateful how things turned out.
“I’m driven to help another family,” Sprague said. “I’m doing it in my brother’s memory so no other family has to go through what my family has gone through.”
(Ray Duckler can be reached at 369-3304, rduckler@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @rayduckler.)