Retired provincial court Judge Wallace Gilby Craig, "The Four Pillars have been reduced to a single toothpick"

NOTE:

This is an edited version, of a written submission, present by Sandy Macdougal (AKA The Sidewinder), at a January 31st, 2017 Public Meeting on homelessness.

In terms of sheltering the homeless, whether they are drug addicts, alcoholics, or mentally ill, I will state at the outset that doing nothing is not an option for our neighbourhood.  The status quo does an injustice to local residents and does nothing to improve the lot of the homeless.

I would also point out that this is not a matter of democracy. It is a matter of government at all levels carrying out their implied duties to maintain peace and good order in our community

The Four Pillars are supposed to include prevention, treatment, enforcement and harm reduction.  A vast array of supportive statistics usually accompany the promotion of these pillars but actual experience and observation by police and the judiciary show another side of the argument.

As stated by retired provincial court J, the Four Pillars have been reduced to a single toothpick, that being the safe injection sites.

Prior to his retirement, Judge Craig spent twenty-five years hearing cases in the provincial court facility at 312 Main Street, in the heart of Vancouver's skid road. He sat on hundreds, maybe even thousands, of drug cases.

“Proponents of the ideology of harm reduction – with their strident claims that reducing harm will bring drug addiction and related crime under control – are nothing more than self-serving propagandists,” Judge Craig stated in a column published in the North Shore News.

He continued that the mantra-like repetitive use of the words 'harm reduction' is intended to make truth out of their illusion that addiction is a manageable illness.

“It is cunning nonsense,” Judge Craig added.

Harm reduction has resulted in the promotion of unmanageable needle exchange programs, frequently unsafe injection sites and open-ended drug maintenance programs using methadone, Judge Craig added.

MEANTIME RIGHT HERE IN KAMLOOPS:

Kamloops Mayor Ken Christian

Januray 31st at 8pm ... at Tweet from @RadioNLNews

#Kamloops mayor @ken_kchristian wants to see a rethink on the

number of free needles harm reduction staff are giving addicts, says

discarded needles creating health risk to the public.

 http://goo.gl/P19BHf  #bcpoli #OpioidCrisis

Kamloops mayor wants fewer needles handed out to addicts

 

As people living near the mobile supervised injection site complain

about crime, an influx of drug dealers, and needles littering the

are the mayor of Kamloops says they have a point.

Ken Christian says mobile injection site staff are getting a little

too liberal when they are handing out supplies to addicts including

way too many needles.  Christian says addicts are then not being

careful when they are disposing their used needles.

“You know I get it. When you are addicted to opioids recycling

probably isn’t your biggest issue. Really what we are creating

now when we try to prevent blood borne disease among users

we are creating now a risk of blood borne disease among the

public. That is unfair and we have to rethink that.”

Christian says the city has a part to play in getting addicts on a road

to recovery including by helping where it can on the housing front.

In my own experience in Maple Ridge, the needle exchange program has resulted in the pollution of private and public property with discarded needles and used condoms, creating a public health risk at huge cost to the city and province.

Al Arsenault, a retired Vancouver City Police constable, told Judge Craig, “Needle exchange programs do not steer addicts away from drug use, nor, does the program serve to promote abstinence.

“Here's your needle, now don't do drugs, is a lousy way to persuade addicts to begin recovery."

There are programs which portray addicts as victims, but it is the merchants and general public (whose property and businesses are targeted by addicts to maintain their drug habits), who are the true victims.

I could continue this approach to my opposition to the illogical low barrier/harm reduction misdirection but I will simply conclude it by saying zero tolerance is the only acceptable and practical approach to either drug addiction or alcoholism.

City and provincial bureaucrats maintain that shelters and recovery facilities must be located in the downtown area because that is where the needed medical and other services are most readily available. They couple that mistaken assumption with the suggestion that homeless people would not likely attend facilities outside the downtown area.

Those simple assumptions are based on a low barrier model which leaves merchants and residents more likely to be victimized by addicts who must steal to support their habits.

By declaring a zero tolerance approach and insisting that police and courts apply rigorous sanctions against people who refuse to take part in any attempt to assist them to recover from their own self-imposed lifestyle issues, the need to remain in a central location soon disappears.

Shuttle services can easily be provided to get to and from facilities located almost anywhere in the community.  The location of recovery facilities and shelters in rural or outlying areas would be far more conducive to recovery than downtown locations which tend to have drug pushers eagerly awaiting their customers within a few feet of the front door of the shelters.

By combining twin policies of zero tolerance, with strictly enforced sanctions against anyone involved in drug related criminal activities, the extraordinary monetary and emotional costs of dealing with drug overdoses and deaths would decline dramatically.  The current system of almost ignoring drug offenses and related criminal activity will only allow the drug epidemic to continue to consume our time, money and the lives of drug addicts.

Judge Craig said he believes much of the problem in the judicial system was initiated when judges began acting as 'social engineers'. He and others believe the current epidemic of drug use and crime has come about as a result of 'limp noodle leadership.'

To conclude, if any project is to enjoy even a modicum of success, it will require facilities that include a separate classification area, a requirement for detoxification on site or in an approved facility, and separate facilities for drug addicts, alcoholics and those suffering from mental illness.

Anyone not falling into the classification of drug addicts, alcoholics or mentally ill could be housed in affordable subsidized public housing in the downtown area simply because the behaviour and issues affecting many people in the last category pose little threat to residents or merchants.

I have deliberately omitted mention of the statistics issued by (Maple Ridge) city hall on how many homeless people have been assisted through the efforts of city hall because those statistics are largely misleading and fail to put forward any plausible or acceptable approaches to solving the problems.

I will only say that most of the people city hall claims to have helped to find accommodations appear to have remained in the downtown area, albeit, not in the shelter. Most have remained downtown where they continue their lives of crime and drug use unabated and with little fear of law enforcement.

SANDY Macdougall ... is a retired newspaper reporter. He was elected for three consecutive terms to Maple Ridge municipal council in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and also ran for the Progressive Conservatives in Kim Campbell's ill-fated federal election campaign.