QUAINT STREET, MEAN STREET

Hard-Core Drug Users Transform Cormorant Street Into Nightly 'War
Zone'

A "tribe-like" group of hard-core drug users has taken over the
800-block Cormorant Street near the needle exchange headquarters,
transforming the area with quaint homes into a "war zone" at night.

Stewart Johnston, a lawyer who moved his practice to the area last
summer, said by daytime "it is a quiet and quaint area with nice
heritage houses" .. but at night it turns into a "war zone" with
people "going out of their minds" strewing needles, garbage and even
feces around.

Johnston said cars have been vandalized and he fears for the safety of
his female staff.

The problem has become so extreme that a volunteer who picks up
needles in the area to top up his $100 disability allowance says he
won't do the rounds on Cormorant because it has got so dangerous.

Michael Miles, 44, said another volunteer with AIDS Vancouver Island
was beaten at 4 p.m. when taking donated sandwiches into the needle
exchange. He urged the non-profit society to hire security.

A spokesman for AVI could not be reached for comment but mention of
the group of drug users outside the AVI office is in a Victoria police
report on homelessness. That report is going to city council today.

The police report notes that about 45 homeless drug users do not use
shelters "and would rather hang around together in a 'tribe-like'
culture moving from AVI, to Streetlink, to the west side of the
Johnson Street Bridge."

Police estimate there are 163 people living on the street and in
parks, and the remainder of the 315 identified as homeless are housed
daily in emergency shelters.

The figure is lower than 700 estimated by the Victoria Cool Aid
Society, which did it's first homeless count in 2005 and is repeating
the exercise next week.

But Victoria police Insp. John Ducker said the figures would likely be
consistent had police included people who used shelters, lived in
vehicles or hotels, sex trade workers who stayed with dates night to
night and those who couch surf.

Ducker said the police survey was intended to identify the truly
"roofless" or visible homeless living on streets or in parks, and
those who regularly came into contact with police.

In 2006 police responded to 2,357 calls in the area bounded by
Blanshard Street, Caledonia Avenue, Vancouver Street and Pandora
Avenue, which includes Cormorant Street.

The group hanging around Cormorant Street is among the toughest to
house, said Don McTavish, manager of shelters for the Victoria Cool
Aid Society.

"They need a place geared to their addictions," said McTavish, adding
that some can't use the available services because of their
behaviours. Required services range from safe injection sites through
to more treatment beds for people with addictions.

Of the 315 people identified as visibly homeless in the police
report:

- - 152 find sleep in shelters,

- - 163 sleep on streets or in parks,

- - 20 are under the age of 18,

- - 45 are intravenous drug users,

- - 50 are female,

- - 20 stated they wouldn't use an emergency shelter because they have
the right to sleep in public places.

30 per cent said they came from other parts of Canada and had been in
Victoria less than a year.

Last year, there were reports that a large number of homeless people
from Vancouver had migrated to Victoria. The police survey noted that
only six people "identified themselves as recent arrivals from
Vancouver -- contrary to earlier perceptions."

The police report noted "a spike in the number of heavy I.V. drug
users on our streets, but the female population appears to be growing
at a faster rate than males. The drug of choice is injectable cocaine
followed by crack cocaine..."

Few homeless people said they used crystal meth, the report noted.