Single Source Procurement: Drug Users Health Centers of Excellence

Pursuant to New York State Finance Law § 163.10(b), The New York State Department of Health is presenting the following summary of relevant circumstances, and material and substantial reasons why a competitive procurement was not feasible.

HIV and AIDS in New York State cannot be addressed without focusing on injection drug users (IDUs) and syringe exchange programs. The Syringe Exchange Programs (SEP) initiative was established in 1992 to address the HIV epidemic in injection drug users. Syringe exchange is the one intervention that can be described as the gold standard of HIV prevention for injecting drug users. The data shows that syringe exchange is one of the most successful HIV prevention initiatives of the AIDS Institute, based on the numbers of lives and health care dollars saved. In 1992, 52 percent of newly diagnosed AIDS cases were among IDUs. In 2012, IDU risk accounted for only 3 percent of new HIV diagnoses.

The SEP was initially approved through procurement DOH01-0000393-3450000 for the period of 7/1/13–6/30/18. An amendment to that procurement was subsequently approved, which contained program expansions for reaching young intravenous drug users - component 2 of DOH01-0000748-3450000 for a period of 7/1/14-6/30/16.

The NYSDOH AIDS Institute has requested amendments to several Harm Reduction/Syringe Exchange Program contracts to establish Upstate Drug User Health Centers of Excellence.

Contractors were awarded contract(s) as a result of the competitive procurement process.

Procurement / Program Name Drug Users Health Centers of Excellence
Contractor Name(s)


Catholic Charities AIDS Services
EHS, Inc.
Southern Tier AIDS Program
Contract Period 7/1/2016 – 6/30/2018
Contract Number(s)


C028473
C028476
C028485