Peter Gaumond

Peter Gaumond joined the Office of National Drug Control (ONDCP) in October 2010 as the Chief of the Recovery Branch. He currently serves as a Senior Policy Analyst supporting the National Cocaine Coordination Group (NCCG) and helps coordinate the activities of the NCCG and the ONDCP Public Health, Education, and Treatment Group. In this capacity, Peter provides expertise on a wide range of public health policy and regulatory issues. As Chief of the Recovery Branch, Peter helped frame the federal government’s approach to improving long-term recovery outcomes, assisting in the development of national policy goals and objectives and creating and implementing plans to achieve them. Peter has more than 25 years’ experience in the substance use disorder treatment and recovery field.

Prior to joining ONDCP, Mr. Gaumond served as a Senior Associate at Altarum Institute, where he provided technical assistance to states and tribes implementing initiatives funded through the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Access to Recovery Program, and at Abt Associates, where he served as Project Manager for the SAMHSA Partners for Recovery Initiative. Before moving to the Washington, DC area, Peter served as the Administrator of Program Development for the Illinois Division of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse (DASA). In that role, he was charged with improving systems and services, and overseeing a wide range of initiatives, programs and projects budgeted at approximately $30 million annually. He led a team of 10 who applied for and managed federal grants and who implemented and managed innovative projects funded by the state, such as the development of co-occurring mental health and substance use disorder treatment networks, compulsive gambling treatment, and cross-system, cross-agency teams to serve homeless people with substance use, mental health, or co-occurring disorders. He also represented DASA on the Executive Committee of the Chicago Continuum of Care.

Earlier, Mr. Gaumond served an analyst at the Illinois Bureau of the Budget (now the Illinois Office of Management and Budget), where he was responsible for the budgets of the Department of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse, the Department of Aging, and the Guardianship and Advocacy Commission. Before joining the State of Illinois, Mr. Gaumond served as a program director, family educator, and counselor in the addictions treatment field; as an English and French instructor; and, as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Burkina-Faso, West Africa, where he taught at the University of Ouagadougou.

As a person in long-term recovery from addiction to alcohol, Peter works to raise awareness of addiction and recovery in order to reduce the stigma and misunderstanding that still surround substance use disorder and thereby help remove obstacles that can prevent people with SUD from achieving long-term recovery and fully rejoining and contributing to their communities. Mr. Gaumond holds an MA from the University of Chicago, School of Social Service Administration and a BA in English from Marquette University. He also studied at the Université de Paris V (Académie Rene Descartes) and at the Université de Paris IV (La Sorbonne). He serves on the Executive Committee of the Alumni Board of the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration.