HOUGHTON — Houghton County could get $40,000 to $50,000 per year as part of a nationwide opioid settlement.

Johnson & Johnson and the country’s three largest pharmaceutical distributors — Cardinal Health, McKesson, and AmerisourceBergen — agreed to a $26 billion settlement in August.

The money will be disbursed to counties over an 18-year period, Vice Chairman Tom Tikkanen said at Tuesday’s meeting. Most of the money will go toward opioid treatment and prevention.

The settlement depends on the agreement of 100% of the counties involved, Tikkanen said.

The county will also hold a meeting to determine how it will spend the money it is receiving through American Rescue Plan (ARP) funding.

County department heads will meet with the board during a Committee of the Whole meeting at 1 p.m. March 8. Commissioner Glenn Anderson suggested a second meeting with public input. No date for that meeting has been set.

The board also denied a Freedom of Information Act appeal from Joshua Vissers of the Copper Beacon regarding check registers from December and January and a building inspector’s report.

Administrator Elizabeth Bjorn said the check register is made available to the public on a bulletin board on the second floor of the courthouse; actual checks are available to view and to make “an abstract or a memorandum.” Bjorn said she didn’t want to make PDFs available, as requested, due to the potential to release personal information.

In a response on his website, Vissers pointed out the county had not cited a particular precedent in its formal response, such as Section 13 of the state’s FOIA law, which lists legal exemptions from disclosure. He also pointed out part of the FOIA law which requires the government entity to separate any non-exempt information through methods such as redactions, and allows the government to charge for the cost and time of the work. The county had not informed him of any such cost, Vissers said.

The county will also apply for a Department of Environment, Great Lakes & Energy (EGLE) materials management grant with the help of Western Upper Peninsula Planning & Development Region. The grant would be $10,000 for an individual county and $12,000 if multiple counties collaborate.

The grant would help WUPPDR assist Houghton and other counties in improving recycling opportunities. Lisa McKenzie of WUPPDR said it is reaching out to all six counties in its region.

“Recycling, it takes volume to make it cost-effective,” she said, adding that materials management had other components. “It’s solid waste, it’s composting, it’s a lot of different aspects.”

The board also:

• heard from Clerk Jennifer Kelly there would be a new office policy to keep the clerk’s office open during normal business hours with at least one person in the office.

• received the 2021 report from the county Land Bank Authority. The authority had 27 parcels in its inventory at the end of 2021. Of the 24 it had at the start of the year, two were transferred. It purchased five tax-foreclosed parcels, one of which was sold. It also purchased another property from the state Land Bank Authority for $1.

• approved up to $3,200 for U.P. Engineers & Architects to perform HVAC upgrades on the ground floor of the courthouse. The lack of airflow had reduced the lifespan of county equipment, including servers, Administrator Elizabeth Bjorn said.

• approved the 2022 agreement with Michigan State University Extension for $40,000.