When opioid-settlement dollars are routed into police hardware rather than treatment, the line between public health and public safety is not just blurry—it is contested by design, and Washington Township, New Jersey, has become a case study in how that ambiguity plays out on the ground.
The Short Version
- Municipal records reviewed by reporters and watchdogs show Washington Township used opioid-settlement funds to buy two Chevrolet Tahoe police SUVs and a network of Flock license-plate readers.
- The purchases were attributed, in state reporting, to school-based narcotics and drug-education programming in amounts that match the equipment spending to the cent, according to published analyses.
- New Jersey’s own guidance limits settlement uses to opioid prevention, treatment, recovery, and related strategies; a public-health expert says Flock cameras are not an evidence-based opioid intervention.
- The case sits within a national pattern: large shares of settlement spending flow to a broad “other” category that frequently includes law enforcement, fueling recurring classification and compliance disputes.
What Washington Township bought with opioid funds
From 2024 through 2026, Washington Township in Gloucester County reportedly charged opioid-settlement accounts for two 2024 Chevrolet Tahoe police SUVs and a suite of Flock license-plate reader cameras. Reporting describes a total for vehicles and cameras near $268,000, with the camera costs appearing across multiple bill lists and renewals. Itemized entries cited by those reviews include $35,000 for 10 cameras in April 2025, $7,020 for two cameras in February 2026, and $17,634.99 for five additional cameras, alongside charges for data retention and renewals attributed to Flock Group Inc.
The state expenditure certification associated with the same period reportedly lists $170,446.70 spent on “school-based narcotics and education” and “drug education.” Audit reviewers and NJ.com’s coverage say that exact dollar figure matches, line-for-line, the recorded payments for the Tahoes and the first 15 Flock readers—an alignment that, on its face, raises questions about how Washington Township characterized the purchases in required state reporting.
Why that spending conflicts with the settlement’s stated purpose
New Jersey’s formal guidance is explicit on first principles: settlement dollars must be used for opioid prevention, treatment, recovery, and other evidence-based or evidence-informed strategies aligned with the agreements; they “may not be used for other purposes.” The state also emphasizes tracking, documentation, and accountability for every dollar. These are not advisory preferences; they are the compliance architecture for accepting the funds.
Against that standard, Rutgers public-health scholar Rafael E. Pérez-Figueroa’s assessment is direct: automated license-plate readers are a law-enforcement and surveillance tool, not an evidence-based public-health intervention to reduce opioid-use disorder or overdose mortality. That judgment goes to the heart of the matter. Buying Flock cameras may be defensible for policing purposes, but the state’s framework requires a demonstrable link to opioid remediation strategies—not general crime control.
The legal gray zone that municipalities invoke
If the guidance sounds airtight, practice is more complicated. New Jersey allows settlement funds to support certain law-enforcement activities that are directly connected to the opioid crisis—pre-arrest diversion, police-assisted treatment referrals, co-responder models, overdose response training, and transportation to treatment among them. The permissible-uses schedule is not a short, exhaustive shopping list; it contemplates programs where public safety and public health collaborate. In that gray zone, a vehicle could be justified if it is materially deployed for overdose response or diversion operations, and a technology expense could fit if it is integral to an approved intervention—though such justifications require specific program design and documentation.
Washington Township’s reported filing, however, did not describe a diversion program, a co-responder unit, or an overdose-response platform; it attributed the matching dollars to school-based narcotics and drug education. That is a legitimate prevention category in many contexts, but it does not, on its face, explain the acquisition of two police SUVs and a plate-reader network. When categories and expenditures are decoupled this way, oversight bodies and the public will predictably press for the connective tissue: the program plan, assignments, deployment logs, curricula, and measured outcomes that would tie the spending to opioid remediation rather than routine patrol or general surveillance.
How this fits a national pattern of contested categories
Washington Township is not an outlier in facing heat over law-enforcement spending from opioid settlements. Across states and localities, a large share of reported outlays lands in a capacious “other” bucket that frequently captures policing, mixed public-safety activities, workforce costs, and equipment. One national legislative analysis tallied roughly $2.19 billion reported through 2024, with the “other” category comprising about $903.1 million—41.3 percent of the total. This doesn’t prove misuse; it does show why disagreements recur. The same line item can be presented as an overdose-response asset in one ledger and as general law-enforcement equipment in another, depending on how the program is built and documented.
New Jersey has already seen the consequences of weak alignment between labels and reality. The Office of the State Comptroller has issued guidance underscoring that recipients must use settlement funds for opioid remediation, maintain detailed records, and be prepared for audit scrutiny—reinforcing that classification alone will not carry the day if deployment and outcomes do not match the stated purpose.
Washington Township spent opioid settlement funds on license plate cams, police SUVs, according to https://t.co/L0lJyHE8sK investigation https://t.co/AO2ZKFFDkz pic.twitter.com/OC2gEhc4PC
— The Philadelphia Inquirer (@PhillyInquirer) October 9, 2026
Accountability hinges on program design, documentation, and deployment
Three questions separate compliant, defensible spending from post hoc rationalization. First, mechanism: what is the specific opioid strategy the purchase enables—pre-arrest diversion, overdose rapid response, data-driven outreach—and how does the equipment function within that workflow? Second, governance: where are the policies, training, MOUs with health partners, and access controls that align the tool with the opioid mission rather than general policing? Third, proof of use: vehicle assignment logs, dispatch data, overdose-response records, referral counts, and program evaluations that substantiate the claimed nexus to prevention, treatment, or recovery.
Washington Township’s reported pattern—opioid-account payments for police SUVs and plate readers, paired with state filings that cite school-based drug education—invites precisely those questions. Without a programmatic through-line connecting the assets to prevention or treatment strategies, the purchases look like classic capital spending for public safety. With a robust design and evidence of targeted use, the same assets could potentially fit. The burden of that demonstration sits with the municipality under New Jersey’s framework.
What oversight and best practice look like
The remedy is neither complicated nor novel. Municipalities should adopt a written opioid-remediation plan that maps every proposed expenditure to an approved strategy; pair police departments with public-health partners to build co-responder and diversion protocols; and publish plain-language justifications alongside contracts and invoices. When equipment is purchased, assignment and usage data should be retained and summarized annually, including overdose responses supported, referrals completed, and training delivered. These are standard elements of grants compliance; the opioid settlements demand the same rigor.
For Washington Township, the path forward is straightforward: disclose the program documents that purportedly justify the Tahoes and Flock cameras under opioid categories, align future certifications with the expenditures they describe, and—if the gear cannot be credibly tied to opioid remediation—reprogram future settlement dollars toward interventions with demonstrated impact, such as medications for opioid use disorder, naloxone distribution, recovery housing, and peer support. That is what the settlements were meant to underwrite.
Sources:
nypost.com, inquirer.com, nj.com, hoodline.com, opioidaudit.com, reddit.com, nj.gov
