Carbon County has been recognized for its efforts to help inmates with addiction.

On Thursday at the commissioners' meeting, Jamie Drake, director of Carbon-Monroe-Pike Drug and Alcohol Commission, and Sheriff Anthony Harvilla highlighted an award the county received last month.The 2016 County Criminal Justice System Best Practices Small County award, presented by the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania, was presented to Carbon at a conference in State College.Carbon County was recognized for its jail community treatment program, which aims to work with inmates by bringing in a full-time drug and alcohol counselor who begins counseling and treatment sessions while the person is incarcerated.In recent years, Carbon County has seen an increasing number of inmates who have addiction problems, which contributed to the overcrowding issue.Drake said that based on current standards, the counselor is only able to serve 35 inmates at a time, but the help that is given provides the building blocks of treatment to create a seamless transition from inpatient to outpatient services after incarceration."We feel like we are just scratching the surface," she said. "There are many more people who are in need of that help, but we at least started. Hopefully as time goes on we will find ways to increase that and get more inmates seen through different collaborations we are working on."Harvilla said this program ties in nicely with the current re-entry program the county has been working to implement."It's absolutely vital for the inmates to be plugged into the community programs before release," he said."This is a good example where inmates are plugged into a community program and it gets them set for what they need to do for supervision in the community."Commissioners' Chairman Wayne Nothstein said that with the drug epidemic plaguing the country, this is a small step in combating it.He pointed out that last year EMS received 500 calls for overdoses. As of June 30, there have been 327 calls for overdoses, meaning that Carbon County is on schedule to hit nearly 600 or more by the end of the year.