A Kingston-based nonprofit has abruptly shuttered its emergency shelter in Saugerties, leaving residents and county staffers scrambling to find new placements. The shutdown of the Samadhi Refuge program came after county Department of Social Services officials declined to reimburse the drug treatment nonprofit for housing clients at the shelter who were not DSS clients or were ineligible for emergency housing benefits.

Founded in 2018, Samadhi started as a grassroots effort to address the escalating opioid epidemic through direct outreach to addicts and therapy incorporating the principles of mindfulness. Today, Samadhi has a budget of $1.9 million and holds contracts with the state Office of Alcohol and Substance Abuse Services to run treatment and outreach programs. The group operates an outpatient treatment program in space leased from Ulster County at 368 Broadway and employs a street outreach team that patrols areas — like Kingston’s Midtown Linear Park — where addicts congregate to distribute Narcan and other harm-reduction supplies and help those who are amenable get into treatment.

In 2022, Samadhi opened the 27-bed Refuge program in a former motel at 451 Washington Ave. in Saugerties. The nonprofit touted the new facility as an alternative to the network of motels that accept reimbursement from DSS to house individuals who might otherwise be sleeping on the street — one that would employ on-site addiction counselors to help residents manage and overcome their substance abuse issues.

But the shelter soon began to generate complaints from the community over quality-of life conditions. In March 2024, then-Saugerties Police Chief Robert Nuzzo told town officials that the department had responded to the Refuge facility 37 times the previous year for calls that included overdoses, disputes and larcenies.

According to published reports, Ulster County Legislator and Samadhi board member Kathy Nolan said the shutdown on Monday came after the county declined to reimburse the nonprofit for $400,000. Nolan said Samadhi leadership had known there was a possibility that the program would be forced to close, but did not inform staff of residents until Friday because they did not want to cause uncertainty as they worked to find a solution. Nolan did not immediately respond to an email from Kingston Wire on Monday.

Amberly Jane Campbell, spokeswoman for County Executive Jen Metzger, disputed Nolan’s characterization and said Samadhi had been paid in full through February 2025. Campbell said DSS officials had not declined to reimburse the $400,000 billed in total, but had declined payment for a number of individuals who were either not enrolled in or ineligible for the emergency housing program. In some cases, Campbell said, individuals housed at Refuge did not meet income eligibility limits. In others, residents either never filled out the application for DSS services or were dropped from the agency’s rolls after they stopped showing up to appointments. Campbell said Samadhi staff failed to check enrollment and eligibility before seeking reimbursement.

“The onus was on Samadhi to make sure that these people were enrolled in the program and met the eligibility requirements and they did not do that,” said Campbell.

Campbell added that DSS staff are working with Samadhi to find new emergency shelter for those displaced and get anyone there who was eligible but not enrolled in the program on the books. In a statement released Monday, Metzger said the effort by DSS would continue until all 20 of the former Refuge residents had someplace to stay.

“Our dedicated team at the Ulster County Department of Social Services has been at the site today assisting people who find themselves suddenly without a place to stay,” Metzger said. “We are focused on getting people the assistance they need and helping them get rehoused as quickly and seamlessly as possible.”

This is not the first time Samadhi has clashed with county officials over reimbursement for services. In December 2022, the nonprofit was awarded a $797,000 contract by the county Department of Mental Health to run outpatient treatment and outreach programs. In January 2024, County Comptroller March Gallagher invoked her oversight authority to stop payment on the contract citing financial irregularities identified by an independent auditor who examined the nonprofit’s 2022 financials. The auditors issued a “qualified opinion” after they were unable to find documentation to support $55,000 in ATM cash withdrawals.

In February, Gallagher announced that she would continue to hold back the funds from the 2022 contract because Samadhi has still not provided results from an audit of its 2023 financials. (Samadhi Executive Director David McNamara said at the time that the audit was not complete and he expected to get the results in a few weeks.) In a statement announcing the continued funding freeze, Gallagher said that her own review of 2023 financial records provided voluntarily by Samadhi showed a number for troubling issues, including direct cash payments through apps like Venmo to clients with active drug addictions and company debit cards used for dinners at high-end restaurants, concert tickets and other questionable expenses. McNamara responded that Gallagher had jumped to conclusions based on raw, unaudited financial data and said that Samadhi had significantly improved its internal controls and record-keeping since the 2022 audit.