Clark County’s ASAP program is in the middle of developing a five-year plan to combat addictions in the community.

The group is already about four months into the process, which may take the rest of the year to complete and finalize said Jennifer Gulley, community health assessment planning coordinator with the Clark County Health Department, which is helping with the process.

”It’s taking some time to bring all this together,” Gulley said.

The plan will focus on four priorities: prevention, overdose intervention, reducing access or inappropriate prescriptions, and early intervention, treatment and services.

Combating the problem, as well as implementing the plan, will take the efforts of the community, she said.

“No one agency can do it alone,” Gulley said. “Law enforcement can not arrest all the people. We can’t collect enough needles.”

A recent strategic plan meeting included representatives from law enforcement, government, health care and mental health care professionals.

The strategic plan was an outgrowth of the community health assessment, which was finalized in December, Gulley said. Having a formal plan in place should help with funding opportunities such as applying for grants for future programs, she said.

“This is our community plan of how we’re going to improve health in our community,” she said.

Gulley said the group hopes to complete the plan by the end of the year.