• DPH
  • RIZE
  • Funded by the MA Department of Public Health, Bureau of Substance Addiction Services and Powered by RIZE Massachusetts Foundation

About Mosaic

Why Mosaic Opioid Recovery Partnership

The opioid overdose crisis has touched every community in Massachusetts, bringing devastation to families, lives, and communities. Such a broad crisis requires an equally broad, collaborative, and equitable response. Mosaic Opioid Recovery Partnership (Mosaic), funded by the MA Department of Public Health, Bureau of Substance Addiction Services and powered by RIZE Massachusetts Foundation (RIZE), is a unique, public-private collaboration designed to fund initiatives that are addressing the opioid overdose crisis in communities and populations that have been historically underserved and have experienced a high rate of opioid-related overdose deaths.

Just like a mosaic, which combines individual materials to create a complete picture, Mosaic brings together the best ideas and initiatives across the Commonwealth to create a comprehensive response to the opioid overdose crisis.

Mosaic is a partnership like no other – it is one of the first public-private collaborations of this magnitude using settlement funds for community-led initiatives. This will help us ensure that the dollars are invested and remain in the communities most deeply impacted by the crisis while also fueling transformative change through grassroots efforts.

Guided by people with lived and living experience, Mosaic is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to lift up and bring together the best and most promising ideas to save lives, end stigma, and improve quality of life for people living with substance use disorder.

Remembering Those We’ve Lost

Mosaic is grounded in hope, optimism, and opportunity. It is also grounded in the recognition that the settlement funding results from the loss of life and devastation our communities have experienced because of the opioid overdose crisis. In every action we take and every decision we make, we carry the memories of those who have been affected, ensuring their stories guide our work.

collage of loved ones lost from the Memory Wall

The MA Opioid Recovery and Remediation Fund

For the last several years, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts has participated in historic legal efforts to hold private companies accountable for the harms caused by the opioid epidemic. Through settlements with those companies, our state will receive more than $900 million over 18 years for substance use prevention, harm reduction, treatment, and recovery support. For certain settlements, Massachusetts will dedicate 40% of the funds to municipalities and 60% to the statewide Opioid Recovery and Remediation Fund (ORRF) to mitigate the impacts of the opioid overdose epidemic.

The funding for Mosaic Opioid Recovery Partnership comes from ORRF. The goal of Mosaic is to create pathways for small, community-based organizations and municipalities to apply for the ORRF settlement funds, ensuring that the funding goes where the need is greatest.

RIZE was chosen to partner with the Healey-Driscoll Administration for its ability to deliver impactful programs and bring together key stakeholders based on trusted relationships and credibility among practitioners, researchers, decision-makers, community leaders, and people affected by addiction.

Guiding Principles

We are guided by people with lived and living experience and are committed to lifting up and bringing together the best and most promising ideas to save lives, end stigma, and improve quality of life for people living with substance use disorder.

Center the voices of people with lived and living experience; Ensure efforts are informed by commitments to equity, inclusion, and compassion; Work to reduce stigma; Advocate for approaches that support people in understanding and achieving their own goals regarding harm reduction, treatment, and recovery

About RIZE Massachusetts

RIZE Massachusetts Foundation (RIZE) is solely dedicated to funding and creating solutions to end the overdose crisis. Guided by those with lived experience and unafraid of new ideas, RIZE is building networks, designing programming, and supporting community partners who are using novel approaches to preventing overdose and increasing access to treatment. RIZE powers Mosaic Opioid Recovery Partnership, a public-private collaboration funded by the MA Department of Public Health, Bureau of Substance Addiction Services. Mosaic is designed to fund nonprofits and municipalities that are supporting the communities and populations that have been historically underserved and have experienced a high rate of opioid-related overdose deaths to make transformative change to end the opioid crisis.

“This is a grant program like no other. Our partnership with the Commonwealth will bring settlement funds directly to the communities most impacted by the opioid crisis. Mosaic is more than a grant program. It is a commitment to the people and communities suffering most from the harms of opioids and an opportunity to center the voices of people with lived or living experience so that the programs we fund save lives and improve communities.”

–Julie Burns, President and CEO, RIZE Massachusetts