NIJ FY24 Research on Law Enforcement Responses to Opioid Overdoses | O NIJ 2024 171913

Opportunity Information: Apply for O NIJ 2024 171913

The NIJ FY24 Research on Law Enforcement Responses to Opioid Overdoses grant is a discretionary federal research award from the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice. Its purpose is to fund rigorous, policy-relevant research that can help law enforcement agencies and their partners respond more effectively to opioid overdoses and the broader overdose crisis. The solicitation is framed within DOJ and OJP priorities around civil rights and equity, access to justice, victim support, community safety, public protection, and strengthening trust between law enforcement and communities. Applicants are expected to follow the OJP Grant Application Resource Guide unless the solicitation specifically changes a requirement.

A central feature of this opportunity is its narrow eligibility: only accredited research universities may apply, and applications from other types of organizations will not be considered. NIJ is looking for studies that examine how law enforcement responds to opioid overdoses in real-world settings, with explicit attention to coordination with linked community agencies. These linked agencies can be public or private entities that currently play, or could play, a role in overdose prevention and response, such as public health departments, behavioral health providers, harm reduction organizations, peer support programs, EMS or fire partners, hospitals, child welfare agencies, victim service providers, and other community-based organizations.

The scope of research must also include specific practices used to ensure the well-being, assessment, and protection of children in overdose-related situations. This indicates NIJ is not only interested in the immediate medical or enforcement response at the scene, but also in what happens when minors are present or affected, how risk and safety are assessed, how referrals and reporting operate, and how cross-system coordination works in practice. Strong proposals will likely map workflows and decision points, identify gaps or promising practices, and measure outcomes that matter for both public safety and public health.

NIJ places heavy emphasis on meaningful engagement with people who have lived experience related to substance use and overdose. Proposals receive special consideration when their methods include authentic involvement of individuals who use drugs or are in recovery, family members, justice practitioners, community members, crime victims, and service providers such as behavioral health clinicians, peer specialists, and harm reduction organizations. In practical terms, NIJ is signaling that research designs should not treat these groups as an afterthought; instead, they should be integrated into the work in ways that shape research questions, interpretation, and dissemination, such as advisory boards, participatory approaches, co-design of instruments, or structured feedback loops.

The solicitation encourages multidisciplinary research teams, reflecting the reality that overdose response sits at the intersection of policing, public health, behavioral health, social services, and community organizations. NIJ also expects applicants to consider and measure issues of diversity, discrimination, and bias, as applicable, across age, gender and gender identity, race, ethnicity, religion, and sexual orientation. This means proposals should be prepared to examine whether responses differ across populations, whether there are disparate impacts or barriers to care, and how agency policies and practices may mitigate or exacerbate inequities.

For proposals that involve partnerships with criminal justice agencies or other organizations, letters of support are required from decision-making authorities at each partnering agency. These letters must acknowledge a key condition of the award: de-identified data generated through the NIJ-funded project must be archived with the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data (NACJD) at the end of the award. NIJ urges applicants and partners to review data archiving guidance early, because data sharing and privacy practices often require legal and operational planning. If an award is made, the grantee is expected to have formal agreements in place with partnering agencies by January 1, 2025, and those agreements must include language that enables compliance with the NACJD archiving requirement.

NIJ is also making dissemination a major evaluation priority, not just a routine final report requirement. The agency is seeking robust, creative, multi-pronged dissemination plans designed to move findings into real policy and practice change. This includes building strategic partnerships with organizations and associations that are positioned to influence training, protocols, legislation, or interagency coordination (for example, law enforcement leadership associations, state and local health partnerships, prosecutor and defender associations, child welfare networks, or harm reduction coalitions). Proposals receive special consideration if they dedicate at least 15 percent of the requested project budget to dissemination activities, and applicants must clearly document that commitment in the budget worksheet and narrative.

Administratively, the award instrument is a grant under CFDA 16.560, categorized under science and technology and other research and development. The funding opportunity number is O-NIJ-2024-171913, with an original closing date of February 12, 2024. The listed award ceiling is $1,000,000. Where multiple agencies will participate using federal funds, NIJ requires a single applicant organization, with other participating entities structured as subrecipients as appropriate; the university applicant is expected to conduct the majority of the work rather than serving primarily as a pass-through. Overall, NIJ is seeking university-led, high-quality applied research that is grounded in partnerships, attentive to equity and lived experience, compliant with data archiving expectations, and designed from the start to translate evidence into improved overdose response practices.

• The National Institute of Justice in the science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "NIJ FY24 Research on Law Enforcement Responses to Opioid Overdoses" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 16.560.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2023-11-27.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2024-02-12. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $1,000,000.00 in funding.
• Eligible applicants include: Others.

Apply for O NIJ 2024 171913

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