CEO Update 257
NABH Welcomes Jim Shaheen to Second Term as NABH Board Chair
NABH is pleased to welcome NABH Board Chair Jim Shaheen, CEO of New Season, to his second year leading the association’s board of trustees.
NABH members voted last month on the association’s 2026 slate of board candidates, and Jim graciously agreed to serve as board chair for another year as NABH continues to move through a staff leadership transition.
A longtime NABH member, Jim has served NABH in many capacities, including presently as vice president of the NABH Education and Research Foundation and member of the Substance Use Disorder Treatment Committee. Previously he served as NABH’s board treasurer.
Jim leads New Season, a nationwide medication-assisted treatment company that serves more than 33,500 patients in 94 clinics located in 20 states.
NABH board member Andrew Lynch, Ph.D., chief strategy officer at Acadia Healthcare in Franklin, Tenn., is now the association’s board chair-elect and will succeed Jim in 2027.
NABH is also pleased to welcome members Gina Sharp, M.B.A., FACHE, president of Endeavor Health Linden Oaks Hospital in Naperville, Ill., and Tanmay Mathur, M.S., M.B.A., vice president of Vanderbilt Behavioral Health in Nashville, who began their NABH board terms on Jan. 1.
Performance Management Coach & Former NFL Player Eric Boles to Open 2026 Annual Meeting
NABH is eager to welcome former NFL wide receiver Eric Boles, CEO and Founder of The Game Changers, Inc., as our keynote speaker at the NABH 2026 Annual Meeting on Monday, March 2.
Boles’s company The Game Changers, Inc. offers a non-traditional approach to performance management through talent development, business strategy, change management, cultural transformation, and peak performance. Under his leadership, Boles helps transform an organization’s most valuable resource – its people – through high-energy and powerful storytelling aimed at unleashing individual potential, navigating change, and leading with purpose.
The company’s recent clients include IBM, FedEx, Motorola, Astra Zeneca, Mayo Clinic, Northwestern Mutual, Medtronic, Motion Industries, Bridgestone Tires, Southeastern Grocers, and Boys & Girls Clubs of America.
Before becoming a sought-after speaker and consultant, Boles learned many of his principles of peak performance, team dynamics, and leadership from his experience as a wide receiver with the NFL’s Green Bay Packers and New York Jets. He is the author of Moving to Great: Unleashing Your Best in Life and Work.
NABH will share information about our other Annual Meeting speakers and program information in future Annual Meeting Alerts each week leading up to the Annual Meeting. Please remember to visit our Annual Meeting homepage to view our Schedule At-A-Glance, register for the meeting, and book your hotel room today!
Advertise in the 2026 NABH Exhibitor and Sponsor Guide!
Showcase your organization’s products and services in the 2026 NABH Exhibitor and Sponsor Guide! Distributed to all registrants at the 2026 NABH Annual Meeting, the Exhibitor and Sponsor Guide features logos, organization descriptions, and additional advertisements. Be sure your organization is included today!
All advertisements are due by Friday, Jan. 30, 2026. Please click here for details about advertising opportunities.
The association also will send the guide to all NABH members after the meeting and post it on the NABH Annual Meeting webpage.
House Passes Bill to Revive ACA’s Enhanced Subsidies for Three Years
Seventeen Republicans joined Democrats in passing legislation Thursday that would revive the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) enhanced subsidies for three years, rebuffing opposition from GOP leadership.
The 230-196 vote followed a procedural vote Wednesday to advance the bill, as nine Republicans joined Democrats in forcing a vote on the House Floor. The enhanced ACA subsidies expired at the end of 2025, leaving the prospect of higher premiums for consumers looming while negotiations dragged into January.
While a straight three-year extension of the ACA tax credits is a non-starter with Senate Republicans, the bill is a potential vehicle for compromise legislation. A bipartisan group of senators is moving closer to a deal on extending the subsidies with some reforms. Such a deal will likely be similar to Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick’s (R-Pa.) bill that would extend the subsidies for two years, cap income at 700% of poverty, require a minimum payment, and create a pathway for consumers to choose to put subsidies in health savings accounts (HSAs). The Fitzpatrick bill also cracks down on brokers, implements pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) reforms, and importantly, extends open enrollment through March.
Lawmakers continue to project optimism about reaching a deal, though thorny issues remain over how to address the so-called Hyde amendment, which restricts federal funding for abortion. Similarly, some Republicans’ long-held opposition to the ACA could ultimately keep a deal from happening. NABH will keep members apprised of any movement on this legislation.
Senate Confirms Journalist Sara Carter to Lead ONDCP
The Senate on Tuesday voted 52-48 to confirm journalist and former Fox News contributor Sara Carter to lead the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP).
A statement from the White House on Tuesday highlighted Carter’s experience as an investigative journalist exposing drug cartels and drug trafficking routes along the U.S.-Mexico border. Trump has spent part of his second term using the fight against illicit drug trafficking to depose Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, and to threaten other countries in the region with military action.
“We will hold accountable the narco-terrorists who infringe upon this right, participating in the deliberate poisoning of tens of thousands of Americans each year,” Carter said in the announcement about her confirmation as the country’s 10th drug czar. “They will no longer kill our families, friends, neighbors, and even children with impunity,” she continued. “At the same time, I will ensure that every parent, family member, and child have the resources they need to prevent and combat addiction. I will stand with our brave law enforcement officials, and with every family who has lost a loved one to drug overdose. This is my promise to the American people.”
DEA and SAMHSA Temporarily Extend Flexibility for Prescribing Controlled Substances via Telemedicine
The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) recently issued another temporary extension of the COVID-19 pandemic-era flexibility to the general requirement for practitioners to conduct an in-person medical evaluation before prescribing a controlled substance.
This extension allows practitioners to prescribe controlled substances via telemedicine to patients with whom they have never had an in-person visit through Dec. 31, 2026. The agencies implemented this extension to give them more time to consider further rulemaking on telemedicine, which could include establishing a special registration for telemedicine, as proposed previously.
Meanwhile, a final rule is now effective that allows practitioners to prescribe buprenorphine for opioid use disorder via telemedicine for up to 6 months before having an in-person visit or leveraging another regulatory pathway for telemedicine (including any forthcoming rule). However, buprenorphine for opioid use disorder is covered by the temporary extension discussed above, so the 6-month time limit would not be imposed until the extension expires at the end of 2026.
Please note that none of the aforementioned regulatory activities affect the use of telemedicine for medications that Opioid Treatment Programs dispense.
CMS Announces $50 Million in Rural Health Transformation (RHT) Program Awards
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced that all 50 states will receive awards under the Rural Health Transformation (RHT) Program, a five-year, $50 billion initiative established under Working Families Tax Cuts legislation (Public Law 119-21, also known as H.R. 1 or the One Big Beautiful Bill Act).
This year CMS will distribute first-year awards averaging $200 million per state. Awards ranged from $147 million in New Jersey to $281 million in Texas. Congress included the RHT program in the July 2025 budget reconciliation bill to mitigate the impact to rural communities of other cuts to the Medicaid program.
CMS has compiled the RHT Program project abstracts each state submitted as part of its application. The Kaiser Family Foundation reported that the first-year RHT funds range from less than $100 per rural residents in 10 states to more than $500 per rural resident in eight states.
In December, CMS established the Office of Rural Health Transformation (ORHT) within the Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services (CMCS) to administer the RHT Program.
Fact of the Week
For the fifth year in a row, use of most substances among U.S. teenagers has continued to hover around the low-water mark reached in 2021, according to latest Monitoring the Future, an annual survey of drug use behaviors and attitudes among eighth, 10th, and 12th graders that the National Institutes of Health has supported for 51 years.
For questions or comments about this CEO Update, please contact Jessica Zigmond.