The Ontario government tabled an omnibus bill Monday that includes a ban on provincially funded supervised consumption sites and a de facto ban on sites approved by the feds.
That’s because they’re only one part of a whole solution. The issue was never the drugs themselves. The reasons people get addicted to drugs are largely systemic in nature. Systemic solutions for systemic problems.
I should lay out that I believe in housing as a basic human right and think that everyone is entitled to a safe and warm place to sleep. But even when arguing from a practical standpoint it’s next to impossible to find a job that will hire a person with no address and possibly no government ID (need an address to get documents!). For people to even have the chance to turn their lives around they NEED a personal living space to store their belongings. Doesn’t even need to be any more complex than a hotel room.
I understand the frustrations with safe consumption sites, but they are realistically solvable, and the only reason we haven’t solved them is because all these politicians are too myopic to realize the long-term benefits of actually helping our communities. They do provide a real service with the guarantee of medical staff on hand and 100% pure doses that won’t instantly kill you. The problem is that without all the other things in place they look very silly.
But even when arguing from a practical standpoint it’s next to impossible to find a job that will hire a person with no address and possibly no government ID (need an address to get documents!)
There are ways around that part, if we cared enough to implement them. There’s a street in—I think it was Italy?—that actually has no physical existence. Addresses on that street are used to give people with no permanent housing something to write on forms that ask for an address, so they can collect mail, including legal documents and government support checks, or apply for jobs. That doesn’t solve the problem of living space directly, of course, but it might be enough to provide a starting point for some people. Or it would if we had enough reasonably-priced housing.
Calgary has another system - the homeless shelter downtown has some short-term residences where you can have an address and phone number for job hunting. (And a warm place to sleep.)
That’s because they’re only one part of a whole solution. The issue was never the drugs themselves. The reasons people get addicted to drugs are largely systemic in nature. Systemic solutions for systemic problems.
I should lay out that I believe in housing as a basic human right and think that everyone is entitled to a safe and warm place to sleep. But even when arguing from a practical standpoint it’s next to impossible to find a job that will hire a person with no address and possibly no government ID (need an address to get documents!). For people to even have the chance to turn their lives around they NEED a personal living space to store their belongings. Doesn’t even need to be any more complex than a hotel room.
I understand the frustrations with safe consumption sites, but they are realistically solvable, and the only reason we haven’t solved them is because all these politicians are too myopic to realize the long-term benefits of actually helping our communities. They do provide a real service with the guarantee of medical staff on hand and 100% pure doses that won’t instantly kill you. The problem is that without all the other things in place they look very silly.
There are ways around that part, if we cared enough to implement them. There’s a street in—I think it was Italy?—that actually has no physical existence. Addresses on that street are used to give people with no permanent housing something to write on forms that ask for an address, so they can collect mail, including legal documents and government support checks, or apply for jobs. That doesn’t solve the problem of living space directly, of course, but it might be enough to provide a starting point for some people. Or it would if we had enough reasonably-priced housing.
Calgary has another system - the homeless shelter downtown has some short-term residences where you can have an address and phone number for job hunting. (And a warm place to sleep.)