Warren County Sheriff’s Chief Deputy John Newsom said the meeting was closed because law enforcement wanted to be able to speak freely with Jones, and they would not be able to talk about investigations in public.
Jones said she heard about what is happening on the front lines, measures being taken to prevent and treat the proliferation of heroin use and the trials of a Mason woman who is on the road to recovery. Perhaps one of the best outcomes of the day was the networking and business card exchanges, she said, so those in attendance would know where to turn in the future.
She said all of the stakeholders will get a contact list of the attendees, and now they need to figure out what to do next. Jones said she plans to digest all of the materials shared at the meeting and decide her next move, which could include a legislative one.
“This community has to come around to a ‘now what do we do,’” she said. “Lots of people are doing lots of things, but we’ve got to answer the question of: ‘Now what?’”
Mason Vice Mayor Victor Kidd, who was the pastor at the Living Leaf Community Church, said he has been networking with Jones, Common Pleas Judge Robert Peeler, Sheriff Larry Sims, Commissioner Tom Ariss and others in an effort to wrestle the heroin problem in the county.
“It’s just so sad. It’s literally like a nuclear bomb goes off in a family and just devastates them,” Kidd said. “I’ve been going out and praying with people, or helping them, or supporting them through the court process, or whatever it happened to be. I just realized this is so bad, I have to do more to do something about this.”
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