Pubdate: Sat, 15 Mar 2014
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2014 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/wEtbT4yU
Website: http://www.nationalpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286
Author: Donald MacPherson
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v14/n247/a01.html

INSIGHT INTO INSITE

Re: Receiver May Take Over Insite Operator, March 13.

Your recent article citing "irregularities" and "significant 
concerns" at the Portland Hotel Society (PHS) ignores the significant 
positive impact PHS has made in Vancouver. Working with some of 
society's most vulnerable people, PHS has developed an impressive 
array of housing and related programs, including harm reduction, 
treatment, banking, several successful social enterprises, food 
delivery, an art gallery and urban gardens, to name a few.

Vancouverites are particularly proud of Insite, a world-renowned 
facility that is being studied by Brazil, Columbia, the U.S. and 
Ukraine, which are looking to benefit from the experience PHS has 
gained on the front lines. Without PHS's multi-year national campaign 
to protect the injection site's legal status, the Harper government 
would have surely shut it down.

PHS may not be faultless. But it has stepped up to house the hardest 
to house, many in 100-year-old buildings with failing infrastructure, 
often with inadequate funding for support staff.

If there have been "irregularities" and PHS needs help to get things 
in order, then we need to sit down with them and work it out. We 
shouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Donald MacPherson, former drug policy coordinator with the city of 
Vancouver, Vancouver.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom