The Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services (SRS) has been awarded a $345,000 federal grant to develop a statewide system aimed at helping fight the use of the drug methamphetamine in Kansas.

The infrastructure development grant, awarded to Substance Abuse Prevention Treatment and Recovery, a division of SRS' Health Care Policy, will be used to provide education to consumers, merchants and agriculture-related businesses about the various products used to make methamphetamine. The statewide project will seek to replicate a very successful methamphetamine education project operating for several years in Shawnee County.

Development of the grant project will involve a partnership between SRS and the state's 13 Regional Prevention Centers, the Kansas Family Partnership, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, and the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Administration, which is an agency formed by the governors of mid-western states to fight methamphetamine abuse. Kansas State University's Research and Extension Services also helped secure grant funding.

The methamphetamine infrastructure development grant was awarded by the Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration/Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, a federal agency within the Department of Health and Human Services. There is a possibility of renewal for two additional years of funding.