The Drug and Alcohol Commission’s payment trail shows one provider losing 75% of its monthly revenue in nine months while the other gained a jail contract, a building, and a growing share of the pipeline.
Previous reporting:
- Part 1: Wayne County Has Four Licensed Addiction Providers. It Pays Two.
- Part 2: PATH Operated at a Loss for Three Straight Years While a Board Member Collected $122,000 as Its Highest-Paid Contractor
Wayne County’s publicly funded addiction treatment system runs through one office. The Wayne County Drug and Alcohol Commission — the county’s Single County Authority under the Pennsylvania Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs — does the intake, does the assessment, and decides the placement.
Two outpatient providers sit on the other end of that pipeline: PA Treatment and Healing, a Honesdale-based nonprofit, and Little Creek Outpatient Services LLC, based in Salem Township. A third provider, The Wright Center, holds a separate contract for medication assisted treatment. The commission, directed by Jeff Zerechak, sends clients to one or the other for outpatient counseling.
For years, PATH was the larger operation. It handled outpatient counseling, intensive outpatient, jail-based treatment at the Wayne County Correctional Facility, and PennFree services. Little Creek ran a smaller outpatient caseload. The check amounts in the Wayne County commissioner minutes reflected that gap.
In nine months, the gap reversed.
The Checks
Wayne County commissioner minutes record every bill the county pays. The Human Services Agency checks — which include the Drug and Alcohol Commission’s provider payments — are approved at public meetings and documented in the minutes with payee, amount, and description.
In May 2022, PATH received $6,494.70 for outpatient, intensive outpatient, jail services, and PennFree. Little Creek received $4,133.50 for outpatient services.
In May 2023, PATH received $5,982.70. Little Creek received $594.
In December 2023, PATH received $4,903.30. Little Creek received $672.
In January 2025, PATH received $16,116. Little Creek received $8,941.
In March 2025, PATH received $17,268. Little Creek received $5,370.
In April 2025, PATH received $10,690. Little Creek received $4,240.78.
In September 2025, Little Creek received $3,653.
In December 2025, PATH received $4,362. Little Creek received $4,443.
By December, Little Creek was getting more than PATH for the first time.
In March 2026, PATH received $5,472. The payment description still reads “OUTPATIENT/JAIL SVCS.” But the amount is less than a third of what it received for the same line item twelve months earlier.
What Changed
PATH’s jail work didn’t go to one place. It was split apart.
For years, PATH provided counseling and group therapy at the Wayne County Correctional Facility. Commissioner minutes describe its monthly payments as “OUTPATIENT/JAIL SVCS” — a bundled line item covering outpatient clients in the community and treatment sessions inside the jail. Medication Assisted Treatment at the jail was a separate contract held by The Wright Center.
On March 6, 2025, the Wayne County commissioners approved a motion to enter into a three-year service agreement with Dunmore Comprehensive Treatment Center to provide Medication Assisted Treatment services for inmates at the Wayne County Correctional Facility. Dunmore CTC is in Lackawanna County. The Wright Center had previously held the jail MAT contract. The MAT prescribing moved to an out-of-county provider.
Seven months later, on October 17, 2025, the Wayne County Office of Human Services Governing Board placed a separate item on its agenda: “AMENDED CONTRACT: Little Creek OP Services; to include jail-based services.” The agenda listed rates: outpatient and intensive outpatient individual sessions at $24 per 15-minute interval, outpatient group at $11.30, intensive outpatient group at $11.30. The amendment gave Little Creek the jail-based counseling and group therapy work that PATH had performed for years. It was the first time Little Creek’s contract included jail services of any kind.
The Wayne County Correctional Facility’s prison board minutes from November 10, 2025 — three weeks after that contract amendment — show the transition was still early. PATH Treatment sessions: 36 inmates. PATH Treatment Group: 5 inmates. Little Creek Treatment: 2 inmates. PATH was still doing most of the counseling inside the jail. But the contract had already been amended, and a second provider was now authorized to do the same work.
The Building
In the April 30, 2026 commissioner minutes, two purchases appear in the approved bills: Dirlam Bros. Lumber and Sherwin-Williams, both tagged to “LITTLE CREEK WALLER.”
“Waller” is a street in Honesdale. The county is buying lumber and paint for what appears to be a building associated with Little Creek in the county seat. A Pocono Review search of commissioner minutes has not located a formal lease or property motion authorizing the project. The work is documented only through supply purchases so far.
If the county is renovating a building for Little Creek’s use in Honesdale, it would give the company a location in the same town where PATH operates and where the Drug and Alcohol Commission’s office sits. Little Creek’s licensed outpatient facility is currently in Salem Township, roughly 15 miles south.
One Operator, Three Names
Little Creek is not one entity. It is at least three.
Little Creek Lodge is a residential treatment facility in Salem Township. Little Creek Outpatient Services LLC is the DDAP-licensed outpatient provider that holds the county contract. Shane’s House LLC — listed in Pennsylvania corporate filings under Allerand Recovery Holdings — is a recovery house for men, also in Salem Township.
All three receive county Drug and Alcohol Commission dollars. The December 2025 commissioner minutes show Shane’s House LLC receiving $532.95 for “RECOVERY HOUSING-NOV 2025.” Little Creek Outpatient Services receives monthly outpatient payments. And the D&A Commission’s own 2018-19 annual report describes Shane’s House explicitly as “a male recovery house owned by Little Creek Lodge.”
The Drug and Alcohol Commission’s August 2021 advisory council agenda lists both “Little Creek Outpatient” and “Shane’s House” under provider updates as a single line item: “Little Creek Outpatient & Shane’s House.”
One operator runs residential treatment, outpatient counseling, and recovery housing under county contract. A client referred by the SCA to Little Creek for outpatient treatment could step up to the Lodge for residential care and step down to Shane’s House for recovery housing without ever leaving the same organization.
The Gatekeeper
In Wayne County, the SCA doesn’t just fund treatment. It controls access to it.
The commission’s Case Management and Treatment Services page describes the process: “If you live in Wayne County, your first step is as simple as calling or stopping by the Wayne County Drug and Alcohol Commission and our Professional Drug and Alcohol Case Management Unit staff will take it from there. We will complete an intake and schedule you for a drug and alcohol assessment. In some cases intake and assessment may be completed on the same day. Upon completion of the assessment, you will be matched with the service(s) that best meets your needs.”
The provider does not choose its own clients, and the client does not choose the provider. The SCA matches them — or doesn’t.
This is how a county with four DDAP-licensed addiction treatment providers ends up paying two for outpatient counseling. The commission’s own website names only PATH and Little Creek as contracted outpatient providers. Serenity Mountain Recovery Center — a women’s residential facility in Waymart that also offers partial hospitalization and intensive outpatient — and Avenues Recovery Center of Lake Ariel hold no SCA outpatient contracts and receive no SCA referrals. Pocono Review documented this provider landscape in a previous report.
The DDAP operations manual requires Single County Authorities to maintain a “comprehensive provider network” and to justify any decision not to contract with a licensed provider operating in their geographic area. Whether Wayne County has filed such a justification is unknown.
$1.37 Million, Two Providers
The Drug and Alcohol Commission’s 2024-25 annual certification statement — ratified by the HSA Governing Board on October 17, 2025 — reports total expenditures of $1,370,473.
That money comes primarily from DDAP block grants, not county taxes. Commissioner Joseph Adams said as much at a May 2020 meeting when approving a contract amendment for Little Creek: “These are not County funds, they are state funds.”
A provider’s Medicaid acceptance status is irrelevant to whether it qualifies for an SCA contract. The SCA pays with block grant dollars, not insurance reimbursements.
Jeff Zerechak has directed the Wayne County Drug and Alcohol Commission for more than a decade. At a March 2019 commissioner meeting, he presented the commission’s annual report. The commissioners’ minutes summarize his presentation: the agency’s “major accomplishments” included “expanded services through partnerships with Little Creek in Salem Township, as well as, recovery housing with Shane’s House.” The commissioners “thanked Mr. Zerechak and his staff for the critical work they do for our community.”
Six years later, the checks tell a specific story. PATH is shrinking. Its jail counseling work was added to Little Creek’s contract. The jail’s MAT contract, previously held by The Wright Center, went to an out-of-county provider.
All payment figures cited in this article are drawn from Wayne County commissioner meeting minutes, which are public documents posted on the Wayne County website. Contract information is drawn from the Wayne County Office of Human Services Governing Board agenda dated October 17, 2025, also a public document. Prison program data is drawn from the Wayne County Correctional Facility’s prison board minutes dated November 10, 2025.
This is the third in a series of Pocono Review reports on Wayne County’s publicly funded addiction treatment system. Previous reports: “Wayne County Has Four Licensed Addiction Providers. It Pays Two” and “PATH Operated at a Loss for Three Straight Years While a Board Member Collected $122,000 as Its Highest-Paid Contractor.”
Pocono Review is an independent investigative news outlet covering Monroe, Wayne, Pike, Carbon, Lackawanna, and Luzerne counties. We report on the government, never for it.
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