‘They don’t have responses’: Pitt School of Pharmacy lays off 40% of PERU staff

Nine minutes into a Zoom meeting on Aug. 16, 32 members of the Program Evaluation and Research Unit staff learned their positions would be ending within two months.

No one had the opportunity to turn on their mics or send a message into the chat.

Jesse Dubin, senior program operations specialist, said they were shocked it happened in that way, but that they knew the situation was potentially impending. 

According to Pitt, PERU is making some “necessary restructuring” and reducing its staff from 76 employees to 44, cutting 40% of the program’s current staff. These decisions went into effect on Oct. 4. 

Jared Stonesifer, senior director of external communications for Pitt, said the decision to reduce the staff was not an easy one, and the decisions were made with the goal of supporting the long-term success and “integrity” of the program.

“While this was a difficult decision, be assured that it was made with careful consideration to maintain the quality and integrity of PERU ongoing projects and future endeavors,” Stonesifer said. “PERU remains fully committed to its mission of facilitating optimal health, well-being, recovery and choice for patients and community members through their research and evaluation work.”

According to Dubin, leadership in PERU has refused to speak to staff about the layoffs or the future of the program.

“We keep asking them questions about the future of PERU and the future of our programs,” Dubin said. “But they don’t have answers.” 

A part of Pitt’s School of Pharmacy, PERU’s mission is to enhance treatment access, promote recovery and reduce fatal overdoses across the commonwealth. PERU received a $7.8 million grant from the National Institute of Drug Abuse last February to improve the quality of treatment for patients with opioid use disorder. 

PERU’s research is in four main areas — substance use disorder education and research, opioid use disorder prevention, intervention and treatment, medication adherence and organizational health for healthcare systems.

These “functional groups” are the main research departments of PERU, according to Dubin, and about 24 PERU employees could be considered “functional group members.” Of those 24, Dubin said 16 lost their positions.

Stonesifer said these positions were grant-funded and that the University would not be financially supporting the program.

“As was clear from the offer letters for these positions, they are research-funded and not University-funded,” Stonesifer said. “At this time, there is not adequate available grant funding to support the continuance of these research positions.”

Dubin said they disagree — it’s not just about funding.

“We were experiencing financial difficulties,” Dubin said. “However, not to this degree, and it clearly wasn’t about solving these financial difficulties.”

Dubin was a part of the hiring committee for the new executive director role. Janice Pringle, the former director and founder of PERU, took leave from her position on Nov. 9, and on Feb. 5,  Amy Seybert, dean of the School of Pharmacy, said Pringle formally left her role. Since Feb. 5, a new director has not been appointed — however, applicants have been interviewed.

Dubin sent a letter to all of the interviewed applicants, detailing the recent developments at PERU. They explained the situation and the lack of communication, and about their own experience with the program within the last few months.

“I know that this communication is highly unorthodox and may itself be considered a fireable offense,” Dubin said in the letter. “I am well aware of all this, yet I feel it is my moral and ethical responsibility to ensure you understand what has happened here.” 

According to Dubin, multiple federally funded projects are in jeopardy of being in default, which has the potential to impact the longevity and the ability to acquire funding for PERU but even for the University at large. 

“The impact upon PERU’s projects of such an uninformed decision is dire,” Dubin said. “There are multiple projects I was involved in where I was the only Evaluation person on the grant. With half of my team having been laid off, there is not enough effort remaining on the Eval team to cover those projects. Entire teams have been eliminated, despite having federally funded projects with multiple years left in the grant still to complete.”

Dubin alleges these layoffs occurred before the staff could form a union, and their roles would be better protected. 

Pitt’s staff union sent its ballots out the day before the layoffs of PERU’s staff in August. The Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board certified the election results on Sept. 30, a few days before PERU staff’s last day.

“It would have been harder to do, but not impossible,” Dubin said. “They would have had to justify it, and, you know, provide certain evidence or something in order to do it.”

According to Stonesifer, these firings were not related to the staff union. 

“The PERU staff reduction was in no way connected or related to any staff unionization efforts,” Stonesifer said. “And any suggestion to the contrary is wholly inaccurate.”

In their last few days of work, Dubin said they think about a phrase their grandmother told them.

“If you cross the bridge before you get to it, you pay the toll twice,” Dubin said. “Prepare, but also know you can’t do anything about something you don’t know anything about yet.”