Covering New Jersey's opioid settlement funds?
Hello!
We at Reporting on Addiction — an organization launched in 2020 as a collaboration between 100 Days in Appalachia and the Opioid Policy Institute to improve journalism about addiction — are reaching out to newsrooms across New Jersey to offer a free training that covers how to investigate opioid settlement funds in your state.
Held in at Rutgers University in News Brunswick on Friday, Feb. 6, this free, in-person training by Reporting on Addiction and MuckRock will teach you how to tackle community-based reporting on the billions of dollars in opioid settlement funds flowing into New Jersey, its counties, cities and tribal communities.
This session will include information about your state's settlement and distribution processes, tips on how to file FOIAs and collaborate on tracking the spending decisions, and insights from local experts on how these dollars should and should not be spent.
Follow the Money: How to Investigate Opioid Settlement Spending in Your State
Date and Time: Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, 9:30 a.m. - 3:00 p.m.
Location: Rutgers University School of Communication and Information, SCI-222
4 Huntington St., New Brunswick NJ 08901
Register today: This event is free and open to all newsrooms and journalists in New Jersey, but registration is required.
Description: In this one-day collaborative workshop, Reporting on Addiction and MuckRock will teach you how to tackle community-based reporting on the billions of dollars in opioid settlement funds flowing into your state, its counties, cities and tribal communities. This session will include information about your state’s settlement and distribution processes, tips on how to file FOIAs and collaborate on tracking the spending decisions, and insights from local experts on how these dollars should and should not be spent.
Who Should Attend: Professional and student journalists in local, regional or statewide newsrooms, and editors willing to lead individual or collaborative newsrooms efforts on covering this topic.
Examples of Story Outcomes: Reporting on Addiction and MuckRock collaborated with West Virginia University’s Reed School of Media and 100 Days in Appalachia, a nonprofit regional newsroom, to tackle this type of reporting in West Virginia at the county level. The result was a four-part investigative series titled The Price of Recovery. This project will be a model for other states to complete similar projects, with support from RoA and MuckRock.
Training Schedule:
9:30 a.m. to 10 a.m. - Arrivals, Coffee
10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. - Opioid Settlements 101
11:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. - FOIA + Opioid Settlements
12-12:45 p.m. – Provided Lunch + General Q&A/Discussion
12:45 p.m. to 1:45 p.m. – Tips for covering these stories in your state
1:45 p.m. to 2:45 p.m. - Community Speaker(s) Panel
2:45 p.m.- 3:00 p.m. - Next steps: How RoA and MuckRock Can Help
The event is free and open to all newsrooms and journalists in New Jersey. Registration is required.
Supported in part by a grant from Open Society Foundations