While drug overdose deaths have slightly declined, state lawmakers and groups that focus on addiction recovery services have their sights set on a new target for the next battle: The workplace.

Creating work and home environments to help people in recovery succeed is the focus of a statewide recovery conference taking place in Albany through Wednesday.

State Sen. Nathalia Fernandez, who chairs the Alcoholism and Substance Use Disorders Committee, spoke virtually at the conference Monday. One of her top priorities next session, she said, is to pass legislation to ensure New York businesses have recovery support systems in place for employees.

"Sometimes, the workplace is a starting point of addiction," Fernandez said. "When the workplace is dangerous and you have an injury and the recovery for that injury includes prescription for pain killers, we see that does increase, sometimes, in people becoming addicted.

"...When you are able to put your life in a different place and have the support by your peers to get there, your workplace needs to be just as supportive," she added.

The senator said she and Assembly Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Committee chair Phil Steck will fight to set a criteria for employers to break down a pervasive stigma in the workplace surrounding addiction recovery. It could include economic benefits for employers who keep people in recovery in their jobs. 

About 380 people who work with New Yorkers in recovery registered for the ninth annual conference in Albany sponsored by the state Office of Addiction Services and Supports.

"It's important to recognize how many thousands of people are living a life of recovery," said Ann-Marie Foster, president and CEO of Phoenix House New York, who gave Monday's keynote address.

Fentanyl-laced drugs and synthetic opioids have changed substance-use disorder and what people need to remain alive and get help.

"You can be one and done," Foster told Spectrum News 1. "You can use one time and be done."

Foster is one of dozens of lawmakers and recovery advocates calling on Gov. Kathy Hochul to declare a public health emergency related to the uptick of overdose deaths and expedite funding.

Representatives with the governor's office pointed to CDC data that shows overdose deaths in the state outside New York City declined 13.8% in the 12-month period ending April 2024 compared to the prior year. Overdose-related deaths in New York City declined 6.4% in the same period, according to the CDC.

“We’re taking aggressive, ongoing action to address the opioid and overdose epidemic, which has taken far too many neighbors, friends and family members in New York and across the nation," a spokesperson with Hochul's office said in a statement Monday. "Our efforts are making an impact, as the data shows overdose deaths are declining across New York – and we’re continuing to deploy resources that save lives and help New Yorkers struggling with addiction get the support they need.”

Deaths related to drug overdose are down three percent nationally, according to the latest U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.

But Angelia Smith-Wilson, executive director with the Friends of Recovery New York, said while the latest statistic is encouraging, it reflects a national average, and vulnerable communities such as people in poor, urban areas, Black and minority groups or LGBT people continue to see an elevated risk of overdose deaths.

"If you were to overall look at communities of color and integrate some of those marginalized groups into that, you would see there is really no drop in those individuals still losing their lives," she said.

Until a public emergency is declared, community organizers said the state must make overdose-reversal drugs such as Narcan widely available, fund harm reduction programs and educate the public about the deadly effects of the current drug supply.

"It is our hope that we can have a recovery community organization in every county throughout New York state," Smith-Wilson said. "We estimate that that will probably take about $6 million to do, which, in our minds, is a drop in the bucket."

Fernandez also carries legislation to remove copays for people struggling with addiction who need mental health care, to expand needle exchange programs and machines in health care centers for people to scan their drug supply for deadly chemical additives.

She also sponsors a proposal to allow peer support advocates who overcame addiction to work with incarcerated people, and change state law that forbids people with a criminal record from entering those facilities.

"The best guide, the best support system, is someone who has been there and understood," the senator said. "We need that in our prisons and jails as well."

The state has made more than $335 million in opioid settlement funds available to communities to date, and has distributed more than 800,000 naloxone overdose reversal kits and 20 million fentanyl and xylazine test strips to New Yorkers for free, according to the governor's office.

Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado was initially advertised to be a guest speaker at this week's conference. Representatives from his office said he responded he was not able to attend.