Rensselaer County gets High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area designation

CAPITAL REGION, N.Y. ( NEWS10 ) — New York officials say the designation will increase federal resources to battle the opioid crisis. Rensselaer County District Attorney, Mary Pat Donnelly, says the county applied for the designation also known as HIDTA. “We had a lot of support from our federal partners, law enforcement, Sheriff, Troy Police Department, and many of our legislators. But, unfortunately, the first two times the designations went elsewhere.” She says the third time was the charm and that it took a lot of work to get to that point. “We had to pull specific cases compared to different areas. Talk about basically the nexus between out-of-area trafficking.”

That is something she says will give the county an expanded reach, “Those drugs are coming in from New York City, obviously. But also, Vermont, also Massachusetts and that we are becoming a hub, and the crime that comes with it.”

Senator Chuck Schumer says HIDTA, “Will directly support coordinated law enforcement strategies at all levels and will make more federal resources available to reduce the supply of illegal drugs, like fentanyl, in the Capital Region. This includes giving local law enforcement the ability to purchase key equipment, such as narcotics analyzers and other technology to combat drug trafficking at the ground level.”

He says it is crucial to the partnerships in the community battling the opioid crisis saying it will, “Strengthen treatment access by facilitating critical partnerships between public health agencies and law enforcement and grants can be used to purchase critical equipment like Naloxone kits for first responders to mitigate the number of overdoses and prevent deaths.”

Rensselaer County Sheriff, Kyle Bourgault, welcomes the new designation by saying, “It gives us resources, intelligence resources on the ground. Resources just to help our drug investigators work with other agencies and collaborate to get these drugs off the street.”

He says it will give his deputies access to more data than ever before. “We work with federal agencies. We work with the Crime Analysis Center, where there’s going to be an additional analyst. We work with the district attorney’s office. We collaborate with all our local partners. I think now it’s going to be even more so because of the intelligence.”

A spokesperson with the Capital Region Crime Analysis Center says funding has increased significantly, “Under Governor Hochul’s leadership, funding for the state’s unique Crime Analysis Center Network has increased significantly, with $18 million in state funding currently supporting the network. In addition to Albany, centers are located in Broome, Erie, Franklin, Monroe, Niagara, Oneida, Onondaga, Orange, and Suffolk counties, and New York City and are hubs of state and local efforts to deter, investigate, and solve crimes. Last year alone, staff handled more than 90,000 requests for assistance, helping agencies solve everything from retail theft to murders.”

Albany County has had the designation since the early 2000’s. Sheriff Craig Apple says, “HIDTA opens up doors for additional funding and resources.  I’m happy to have Rensselaer County participating, as that just about covers the Capital District.”

Rensselaer County now joins Albany and Schenectady County in getting these much needed funds in battling the opioid epidemic.

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