While telling the Legislature how the Mississippi Opioid Settlement Advisory Council recommends spending state lawsuit money, Council Chair and Attorney General Lynn Fitch said she and the other committee members would be reviewing their internal processes and may change how they oversee hundreds of millions of dollars. 

It’s one of the first times Fitch has publicly acknowledged there may be better ways for Mississippi to manage the money it’s won in the national opioid lawsuits, cases that charged some of the country’s biggest companies with contributing to a public health crisis that’s killed over 10,000 Mississippians since 2000. 

The Attorney General’s office sent an email addressed to Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and Speaker of the House Jason White late Friday afternoon with two attachments: a finalized list of applications seeking to spend some of the state’s opioid settlement money, and a letter authored by Fitch to the Legislature.

The list, a reflection of the council’s work soliciting and scoring project applications looking to address Mississippi’s addiction crisis, tiers the 127 applications into five categories. The council recommended about $40 million of grant funding in the highest priority category and about $41 million for applications in the second highest group. 

Fitch’s letter summarizes the recommendation list and adds additional messages the council agreed to tell the Legislature. Toward the end of it, she acknowledges that she and the other members may need additional help to make sure funds are spent appropriately. 

“As we prepare for the second round of applications, the Council will be reviewing its process and may determine the need to utilize services to assist in evaluation of applications, tracking of public funds, and others to ensure that the Legislature’s priorities for accountability, transparency, and public involvement are fulfilled,” she wrote.

The Legislature created the council last spring to recommend how lawmakers should spend most of Mississippi’s opioid settlement money and appointed Fitch’s office to lead the effort. Lawmakers gave council members about five months to create application materials, review completed proposals and assess how well they believe applicant organizations will address the addiction epidemic.

The council completed these tasks in that time period, but the process was filled with a variety of issues that concerned overdose prevention advocates both on and outside of the council. From missing application materials in the summer to conflicts of interests and grading discrepancies in the fall, Mississippi Today reported on challenges that led overdose prevention advocates to worry whether the funds would help those who struggle with addiction. 

In the past, Fitch has often responded to the newsroom asking questions about these concerns without proposals to address them. When Mississippi Today asked her about the council conflicts of interest in November, her Chief of Staff Michelle Williams wrote back that the members are state leaders at addressing addiction and are positioned well to address the public health crisis. 

Her idea in the letter to seek out additional services echoes fellow council member James Moore’s message at a meeting last week. Just before the members left, he asked the committee to consider reaching out to groups with expertise in helping states manage opioid settlement funds in the future.

Also in the letter, Fitch said the state has just over $90 million in opioid settlement money that must be spent to address addiction. There’s an additional roughly $15 million in state coffers that her office and the Legislature allow lawmakers to spend the same as any public money.

The setup for those $15 million mirrors the one Fitch created for the settlement money sent to Misississippi’s cities and counties. Elected leaders can spend the money on addressing addiction but don’t have to. A September Mississippi Today investigation found that most of the settlement money local governments were spending went to general expenses rather than addressing addiction — a big reason why the state has spent less money to fight the public health crisis than any other state in the country. 

When Mississippi Today has asked Fitch why she allowed Mississippi to spend large chunks of the settlement funds for purposes other than addiction, her office has said the lawsuits allow for some of the money to repay past government expenses fighting the opioid epidemic. 

State lawmakers are expected to consider the advisory council’s recommendations in the 2026 regular legislative session.