21 U.S.C. § 1708 — Emerging Threats Committee, plan, and media campaign

(a) The Director must appoint or designate a United States Emerging and Continuing Threats Coordinator. The Coordinator must perform the duties described in this section and any other duties the Director assigns. The Director must appoint or designate someone in the Senior Executive Service, or someone in a level 15 General Schedule position or an equivalent position.

(b) Emerging Threats Committee.

(1) The Emerging Threats Committee must:
(A) monitor changing and emerging drug threats in the United States;
(B) identify and discuss changing and emerging drug trends in the United States, using the criteria that paragraph (6) requires the Committee to develop and recommend;
(C) help develop and oversee implementation of any plan described in subsection (d);
(D) give the Coordinator and the Director any advice about strategy and policies for emerging drug threats and trends that the Committee considers appropriate; and
(E) share and help Federal, State, local, and Tribal officials and other entities designated by the Director share pertinent information and data about:
(i) recent trends in drug supply and demand;
(ii) fatal and nonfatal overdoses;
(iii) the demand for and availability of evidence-based substance use disorder treatment, including the amount of unmet treatment need and trends in treatment admissions;
(iv) recent trends in drug interdiction, supply, and demand reported by State, local, and Tribal law-enforcement agencies; and
(v) other subject matter that the Director determines is necessary.

(2) The Director must designate one of the Committee members as Chairperson.

(3) The Director must appoint the other Committee members. The members must include:
(A) representatives of National Drug Control Program agencies or other agencies;
(B) representatives of State, local, and Tribal governments; and
(C) representatives of other entities that the Director designates.

(4) Committee members must meet in person, not through a delegate or representative, at least once during each calendar year and before June 1. When the Director or the Chairperson calls a meeting, the Committee may hold additional meetings as its members choose.

(5) The Director may award contracts, enter into agreements between agencies, manage individual projects, and conduct other activities that support identifying emerging drug threats and developing, carrying out, and assessing an Emerging Threat Response Plan.

(6) No later than 180 days after the Committee first meets, the Committee must develop and recommend to the Director criteria for identifying an emerging drug threat and for ending an emerging drug threat designation. The Committee must base the criteria on information it gathers, statistical data, and other evidence.

(c) Designation.

(1) The Director, after consulting with the Coordinator, the Committee, and the head of each National Drug Control Program agency^*, may designate an emerging drug threat in the United States.

(2) The Director, after consulting with the Coordinator, must issue and make publicly available standards for making a designation under paragraph (1) and for ending that designation. In developing the standards, the Director must consider the Committee’s recommendations and any other criteria the Director considers appropriate.

(3) When the Director makes or ends a designation, the Director must publish a written public statement on the Office’s website portal explaining the designation or its termination. The Director must notify the appropriate congressional committees^* that the statement is available.

(d) Plan.

(1) No later than 90 days after making a designation under subsection (c), the Director must publish an Emerging Threat Response Plan and make it publicly available. The Director must notify the President and the appropriate congressional committees that the plan is available.

(2) At the same time as the annual submissions under section 1705(g), the Director must update the plan and report on its implementation. The Director must continue doing this until the Director issues the public statement required by subsection (c)(3) to end the designation.

(3) The plan must include:
(A) a complete strategic assessment of the emerging drug threat, including the current availability of, demand for, and effectiveness of evidence-based prevention, treatment, and enforcement programs and other efforts to respond to the threat;
(B) complete, research-based, short-term and long-term goals that can be measured for addressing the threat, including goals for reducing the supply of the designated drug and expanding the availability and effectiveness of evidence-based substance use disorder treatment and prevention programs to reduce demand for the drug;
(C) performance measures for the plan’s goals, including measurable objectives and specific targets;
(D) the funding needed to carry out the plan, including whether existing funding can be reprogrammed or transferred or whether additional appropriations are needed;
(E) an implementation strategy for the media campaign under subsection (f), including goals under subparagraph (B) and performance measures, objectives, and targets under subparagraph (C); and
(F) any other information needed to inform the public about the status of, progress on, or response to the emerging drug threat.

(4) Implementation.
(A) No later than 120 days after the designation is made, the Director, after consulting with the President, the appropriate congressional committees, and the head of each National Drug Control Program agency, must issue guidance on implementing the plan. The Director must issue the guidance to the National Drug Control Program agencies and any other relevant agency the Director determines is necessary.
(B) The Coordinator must:
(i) direct implementation of the plan among the agencies identified in the plan, State, local, and Tribal governments, and other relevant entities;
(ii) help those agencies, governments, and other relevant entities share information; and
(iii) monitor implementation by coordinating the development and implementation of collection and reporting systems that support measuring performance and compliance with the plan by the agencies identified in the plan, when appropriate.
(C) No later than 180 days after the designation is made, and in accordance with subparagraph (A), the head of each agency identified in the plan must submit a report on implementation of the plan to the Coordinator.

(e) Evaluation of media campaign. When an emerging drug threat is designated, the Director must evaluate whether a media campaign would be appropriate to address that threat.

(f) National anti-drug media campaign.

(1) To the extent feasible and appropriate, the Director must conduct a national anti-drug media campaign under this subsection. The campaign is for:
(A) preventing substance abuse among people in the United States;
(B) educating the public about the dangers and negative consequences of substance use and abuse, including educating patients and families about the characteristics and dangers of substance abuse and ways to guard against substance use, including safely disposing of prescription medicines;
(C) supporting evidence-based prevention programs aimed at people’s attitudes, perceptions, and beliefs about substance use and their intentions to begin or continue using substances;
(D) encouraging people affected by substance use disorders to seek treatment and giving them information about:
(i) how to recognize addiction problems;
(ii) available evidence-based treatment options; and
(iii) how to obtain that treatment;
(E) combating the stigma of addiction and substance use disorders, including the stigma of treating those disorders with medication-assisted treatment therapies; and
(F) informing the public, as appropriate, about the dangers of any drug the Director identifies as an emerging drug threat.

(2) Use of funds.
(A) Money made available for the national media campaign may be used only for:
(i) buying media time and space, including strategic planning for, tracking of, and accounting for those purchases;
(ii) creative and talent costs, subject to subparagraph (B)(i);
(iii) advertising production costs, including television, radio, Internet, social media, and other commercial marketing venues;
(iv) testing and evaluating advertising;
(v) evaluating the national media campaign’s effectiveness;
(vi) contract costs for activities authorized by this subsection;
(vii) partnerships with professional and civic groups, community-based organizations including faith-based organizations, and government organizations connected with the campaign;
(viii) outreach to the entertainment industry, interactive outreach, media projects and activities, public information, news-media outreach, and corporate sponsorship and participation; and
(ix) operating and management expenses.

(B) Specific requirements.
(i) Creative services. When using money for creative and talent costs under subparagraph (A)(ii), the Director must use creative services donated to the Government at no cost whenever feasible. The Director may buy creative services for advertising only when the advertising:
(I) responds to a high-priority or urgent campaign need that cannot timely be met at no cost; or
(II) is intended to reach a minority, ethnic, or other special audience that cannot reasonably be reached at no cost.

(ii) Testing and evaluation of advertising. When using money under subparagraph (A)(iv), the Director must test every advertisement before using it in the national media campaign. The testing must ensure that the advertisement is effective with its target audience and meets industry-accepted standards. The Director may waive this requirement for advertisements using no more than 10 percent of the advertising time purchased under this subsection in a fiscal year and no more than 10 percent of the advertising space purchased under this subsection in a fiscal year, if the advertisements respond to urgent, time-sensitive campaign needs or will not be used widely in the campaign.

(iii) Consultation. In planning the campaign under paragraph (1), the Director may consult with:
(I) the head of an appropriate National Drug Control Program agency;
(II) experts on the designated drug;
(III) State, local, and Tribal government officials and relevant agencies;
(IV) communications professionals;
(V) the public; and
(VI) the appropriate congressional committees.

(iv) Evaluation of effectiveness. When using money under subparagraph (A)(v), the Director must:
(I) designate an independent entity to evaluate the campaign’s effectiveness by April 20 of each year, using data from the Monitoring the Future Study published by the Department of Health and Human Services, the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, and other relevant studies or publications the Director determines are relevant, including tracking and evaluation data collected under marketing and advertising industry standards; and
(II) ensure that the evaluation allows consideration of whether the campaign contributed to changes in the target audience’s attitudes or behavior about substance use, along with any other evaluation measures the Director determines are appropriate.

(3) Advertising. The Director must ensure that enough money is allocated to meet the national media campaign’s stated goals.

(4) Responsibilities and functions.
(A) The Director must determine the campaign’s overall purposes and strategy.
(B) Director.
(i) The Director must approve:
(I) the campaign’s strategy;
(II) all advertising and promotional material used in the campaign; and
(III) the plan for buying advertising time and space for the campaign.
(ii) The Director is responsible for carrying out a focused national media campaign that meets paragraph (1)’s purposes. The Director must ensure that:
(I) information disseminated through the campaign is accurate and scientifically valid; and
(II) the campaign uses strategies shown to be most effective for achieving paragraph (1)’s goals and requirements. These strategies may include:
(aa) a media campaign described in paragraph (2);
(bb) local, regional, or population-specific messages;
(cc) websites that publicize and distribute information;
(dd) outreach to parents and educational resources for parents;
(ee) collaboration with law-enforcement agencies; and
(ff) support for school-based public-health education classes that improve teenagers’ knowledge about the effects of substance use.

(5) Prohibitions. Money made available under paragraph (2) may not be obligated or spent:
(A) to replace existing community-based anti-drug coalitions;
(B) to replace free public-service time donated by national or local broadcasting networks for other public-service campaigns;
(C) for partisan political purposes or for express advocacy supporting or defeating a clearly identified candidate, ballot initiative, legislative proposal, or regulatory proposal;
(D) for advertising featuring elected officials, people seeking elected office, Cabinet-level officials, or other Federal officials employed under section 213 of Schedule C of title 5, Code of Federal Regulations;
(E) for advertising that does not contain a primary message intended to reduce or prevent substance use; or
(F) for advertising whose primary message is intended to promote support for the national media campaign or private-sector contributions to it.

(6) Matching requirement.
(A) Money made available under paragraph (2) for media time and space must be matched by an equal amount of non-Federal money for the national media campaign or by in-kind contributions of the same value.
(B) The Director must ensure that at least 85 percent of no-cost match advertising directly concerns substance-abuse prevention consistent with the campaign’s specific purposes.
(C) No-cost match advertising that does not directly concern substance-abuse prevention consistent with the campaign’s purposes must include a clear anti-drug message. That message does not have to be the advertising’s primary message.

(7) Financial and performance accountability. The Director must arrange for:
(A) audits and cost reviews of the national media campaign under section 4706 of title 41; and
(B) an audit to determine whether the campaign’s costs are allowable under chapter 43 of title 41.

(8) Report to Congress. Each year, the Director must send Congress a report describing:
(A) the campaign’s strategy and whether it achieved specific objectives;
(B) steps taken to operate the campaign effectively and efficiently, consistently with its overall strategy and focus;
(C) plans to buy advertising time and space;
(D) policies and practices used to ensure responsible use of Federal money to buy advertising time and space and to eliminate the possibility of waste, fraud, and abuse;
(E) every contract with a corporation, partnership, or individual working for the campaign;
(F) the results of any financial audit of the campaign;
(G) evidence used to develop the campaign;
(H) specific policies and steps used to comply with this section;
(I) a detailed accounting of money obligated during the previous fiscal year to carry out the campaign, including each recipient, each expenditure’s purpose and amount, available outcome information, and any other information needed for a complete accounting of money spent; and
(J) a review and evaluation of the campaign strategy’s effectiveness during the previous year.

(9) Required notice for communication from the Office. Every communication, including an advertisement, that the Office pays for or otherwise distributes directly or through an Office contract must prominently tell the audience that the Office paid for the communication.

(g) Authorization of appropriations. The law authorizes appropriating $25,000,000 to the Office to carry out this section for each fiscal year from 2018 through 2023.