Pubdate: Wed, 25 May 2005
Source: Province, The (CN BC)
Copyright: 2005 The Province
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/vancouver/theprovince/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/476
Author: Joey Thompson
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?136 (Methadone)

STEP UP FOR FREE HEROIN -- WHAT, NO TAKERS?

Life's Too Good For Downtown Junkies To Sign Up For Drugs

Providing valet social services to 4,000 junkies in the city's soiled 
Downtown Eastside (DTES) neighbourhood is capital B Big Business -- a 
growth industry.

Half a billion dollars is the tidy sum working Canadians spend to ensure 
the area's addicts have continuous top-of-the-line medical and legal 
services, food, shelter, needles and a comfy place to get wasted. And like 
every other service, delivery costs keep climbing.

At last count, there were more than 50 non-profit service store-fronts in 
the area; each one with salaried workers who understandably want to keep 
their jobs. When was the last time a social agency announced "mission 
accomplished, now we can fold up our tents?"

The list of do-gooders lined up to hand-deliver services to these guys 
grows while we continue to turn our backs on all the minimum-wage, 
minimum-skilled moms and dads who, after paying their own dental, housing 
and education bills, find too much month at the end of their paycheques.

What's worse, there is next to no accountability or performance assessment 
on the $500 million that feeds these agencies -- each with its own staff, 
board of directors and organizational hierarchy.

The one politician who cared -- then MLA Lorne Mayencourt -- lobbied last 
year for statute revisions requiring non-profits to get a handle on how 
effectively the money is spent. No changes, so far.

Now another big giveaway has hit the DTES: addicts have been invited to 
step right up and get their free supply of heroin for 12 months, 
compliments of taxpayers through the federal NAOMI research project. 
Eligibility is easy; all the addict has to do is cough up a little 
information on his or her medical and criminal history, live in the area 
and be a hard-core heroin user. Project backers say similar studies in 
Switzerland and the Netherlands found junkies receiving controlled doses 
under government's watchful eye improved physically and mentally, reduced 
drug use, committed less crime, stayed in treatment longer and functioned 
better socially. It's not clear how they accomplished all this but, none 
the less, representative Jim Boothroyd said he expected his telephone lines 
would be ringing off the hook.

In his wildest dreams.

They needed 158 DTES recruits: 21 have shown up.

The fact is, excluding youth and people with mental illnesses, life is too 
easy and the living is too darned free for most DTES addicts. They have a 
daily regimen of free services, they reject officialdom's need to monitor 
their activities, they distrust authority, and they especially don't 
appreciate being told what to do. There are little or no consequences for 
pulling a string of B&Es to bankroll a $200-a-day habit. Methadone is free 
if they want it, and there's no guarantee the fed's freebies will pack the 
same punch their street junk does; after all, Ottawa's pot stunk.

Said one cop mockingly, "Offer them a free stay at the Pan Pacific or pay 
them to participate and they might. Otherwise, what's the incentive? 
They're left alone and just about everything is free already."
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MAP posted-by: Beth