County commissioners last week passed a new policy they say is forward thinking if not trailblazing, unique to Butler County, and will save lives.

They mandated all 605 county employes be trained in the use of naloxone, a controversial antidote to opioid overdoses.

But not everyone is excited ... or in favor ... or even planning to follow the new policy. Quietly, some county employees have expressed concern. And at least one — Assistant District Attorney Ben Simon — is being public about his opinion: “If I wanted to go into the medical world, I would have gone into nursing, med school or have become an EMT or paramedic,” he said.

Simon, who also is county representative of the United Steelworkers Union, said the mandate violates the state and federal constitutions, as well as his employment contract. He alleges the policy whimsically demands employees go “beyond the scope of our employment.”

“What will be the next mandatory training outside my job duties? This opens up personal rights and choices violations,” Simon wrote in a correspondence he sent to the commissioners and county’s solicitor, Mike English.

He is refusing to take the training and says he lodged a grievance on behalf of his bargaining unit.

Simon, who said he is not permitted to discuss the resolution of the grievance, said only, “I’m satisfied with the results.”

According to the rules of the union contract, the first step in the grievance process would be an oral complaint to an employee’s department head.

Simon’s department head is District Attorney Richard Goldinger, who confirmed that Simon filed the grievance but refused to discuss it because it is a personnel matter.

English also said he would not comment on a particular person’s personnel matter.

However, English said, speaking in general terms, allegations of employees who do not follow county policies are handled on a case-by-case basis.

And in the case of the naloxone training, English said, “We are hopeful that people will cooperate... it is just training.”

Once an employee completes the program, he will receive a certificate enabling him to get a prescription of naloxone.

“The employees are not required to carry or use Narcan (the brand name for naloxone),” English said.

English said training “issues are management rights... I’m not sure what rights people believe are being violated.”

Commissioner Kevin Boozel, who sits on the county Drug and Alcohol Committee that recommended the policy, said, “Let’s keep this in perspective. This is a one-time, 15-minute identification and awareness training.”

Boozel said the training, which is set to occur in January, is similar to sexual harassment training that also is mandatory to employees.

Again, he stresses, no one is required to get or use the drug.

“But the worst case scenario would be if something happened (in the court house) and an employee couldn’t help because he didn’t know what to do,” said Boozel, noting that the courthouse is host to a population high risk for opioid addiction. “This (policy) empowers the employee to get the tools they need.”

Boozel said the committee first considered recommending that all employees be mandated to carry naloxone. That idea was later rejected, but officials assert the county’s new policy set a standard in the state.

Ken Kroski, director of media relations at the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania, said that organization does not keep records of those sorts. But, anecdotally, no one within that organization is aware of other counties with similar rules.

Although county training for CPR and use of a defibrillator are voluntary, Boozel — who also is an EMT and a volunteer firefighter — said this training should be different because, “We are in the middle of an opioid crisis, an epidemic.”

All three commissioners stressed that the policy was vetted by a committee that studied the issue for months prior to the commissioners’ vote. And all three stress the seriousness of the opioid problem in the county as a call to quick action.

“Time means everything when it’s life or death,” Commissioner Kim Geyer said of her endorsement of the policy, which passed the board with unanimous approval.

Commissioners Geyer and Leslie Osche said they see the rise of concern as more of a communication problem than a policy problem.

Geyer said U.S. Attorney David Hickton is calling for a three-prong attack on opioid abuse: communication with the public, laws that grant amnesty to people who get help for overdose victims, and widespread naloxone use.

“This (public availability of naloxone) is going to become more commonplace as time goes on ... it will be as common as a defibrillator,” Geyer said. “We, as commissioners, are trying to be proactive and get in front of this as quickly as possible.”

Geyer said she has heard from some county employees “who don’t want to partake in the training because they don’t want to be enablers or they have moral or religious beliefs regarding this issue.”

Geyer said she would be willing to pause the mandate to hear and consider those concerns.

“I have no problem taking a step back, regrouping and making sure we’re all on the same page,” she said.

Osche and Geyer said in the future they will recommend commissioners meet with employees and unions prior to rolling out a new policy.

“The lesson here is about communication,” Osche said.

“The way this rolled out I think that it is legit to say we could have communicated this better.”

It’s unclear how many people in the county workforce feel the same as Simon, whose union represents 10 county employees.

Of the county’s workforce, about 450 are represented by a union, most of those by the Service Employees International Union. Another 100 are represented by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Local and regional representatives of both organizations could not be reached for comment.

Elected row officers are exempt from the policy and for some other county employees, the training already is mandated.

For example, the 32 deputies in the sheriff’s office took the course in concert with a grant program that began about a year ago.

With $10,000 in state funding, the sheriff’s office buys, acquires and distributes $100 naloxone kits to participating county law enforcement agencies.

Chief Deputy Sheriff Mark Peffer, who manages the program, said the money has not yet been completely spent. He said that 95 percent of the police departments in the county carry Narcan.

The deputies are among the agencies who received training and the drug is kept in the sheriff’s office as well as the main lobby of the Butler County Courthouse.

Peffer said it has yet to be used by the department inside the court house. However, one person did overdose inside the building during the year the program has been in operation. Peffer said in that case naloxone was administered by emergency medical personnel.

Peffer said none of the deputies took issue with getting the training, and he could see how it would be beneficial to everyone.

“If nothing else, it would be important to recognize the signs of an overdose versus say a heart attack or stroke,” Peffer said. “This way they could assist the medical personnel being dispatched. Or, if they chose to administer naloxone, they will be better prepared to do so with this training.”

Peffer urged people to weigh the issue as if the person overdosing was a family member or friend.

“You would want them to make a better decision tomorrow rather than dying today,” Peffer said.

Simon doesn’t deny that naloxone saves lives.

“I just think it should be administered by those who are trained to use it,” Simon said. “In my opinion, this (policy) is just going to serve to enable drug users to be emboldened in their use. They will say, ‘Hey, we don’t need to be responsible because the government is forcing other people to deal with our irresponsible acts.’”