S. 2796 

One Hundred Seventeenth Congress 

of the 

United States of America 

AT THE SECOND SESSION 

Begun and held at the City of Washington on Monday, 

the third day of January, two thousand and twenty two 

An Act 

To amend the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 to provide 

for the eligibility of rural community response pilot programs for funding under 

the Comprehensive Opioid Abuse Grant Program, and for other purposes. 

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 

the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Rural Opioid Abuse Prevention 

Act’’. 

SEC. 2. ELIGIBILITY OF RURAL COMMUNITY RESPONSE PILOT PROGRAMS FOR FUNDING UNDER THE COMPREHENSIVE OPIOID 

ABUSE GRANT PROGRAM. 

Section 3021 of title I of the Omnibus Crime Control and 

Safe Streets Act of 1968 (34 U.S.C. 10701) is amended— 

(1) in subsection (a)(1)— 

(A) in subparagraph (F), by striking ‘‘and’’; 

(B) in subparagraph (G), by striking the period at 

the end and inserting ‘‘; and’’; and 

(C) by adding at the end the following: 

‘‘(H) a pilot program for rural areas to implement 

community response programs that focus on reducing opioid 

overdose deaths, which may include presenting alternatives 

to incarceration, as described in subsection (f).’’; and 

(2) by adding at the end the following: 

‘‘(f) RURAL PILOT PROGRAM.— 

‘‘(1) IN GENERAL.—The pilot program described under this 

subsection shall make grants to rural areas to implement 

community response programs to reduce opioid overdose deaths. 

Grants issued under this subsection shall be jointly operated 

by units of local government, in collaboration with public safety 

and public health agencies or public safety, public health and 

behavioral health collaborations. A community response program under this subsection shall identify gaps in community 

prevention, treatment, and recovery services for individuals 

who encounter the criminal justice system and shall establish 

treatment protocols to address identified shortcomings. The 

Attorney General, through the Office of Justice Programs, shall 

increase the amount provided as a grant under this section 

for a pilot program by no more than five percent for each 

of the two years following certification by the Attorney General 

of the submission of data by the rural area on the prescribing 
S. 2796—2 

of schedules II, III, and IV controlled substances to a prescription drug monitoring program, or any other centralized database administered by an authorized State agency, which 

includes tracking the dispensation of such substances, and providing for interoperability and data sharing with each other 

such program (including an electronic health records system) 

in each other State, and with any interstate entity that shares 

information between such programs. 

‘‘(2) RULES OF CONSTRUCTION.—Nothing in this subsection 

shall be construed to— 

‘‘(A) direct or encourage a State to use a specific interstate data sharing program; or 

‘‘(B) limit or prohibit the discretion of a prescription 

drug monitoring program for interoperability connections 

to other programs (including electronic health records systems, hospital systems, pharmacy dispensing systems, or 

health information exchanges).’’. 

Speaker of the House of Representatives. 

Vice President of the United States and

President of the Senate.