CENTRETOWN CLINIC WAS HANDLED BADLY

Just about every city needs drug-treatment centres, but it's no
surprise people who live near a planned private methadone clinic on
Somerset Street don't want one in their neighbourhood. By definition,
the clinics -- which treat heroin addicts with a drug that helps them
through withdrawal the way nicotine gum helps some smokers -- attract
drug addicts.

According to a U.S. study, criminal activity among heroin addicts who
started using methadone dropped 52 per cent. That's pretty good, but
of meagre comfort to the elderly people who live in the apartments
above the planned Ottawa clinic or the people who run nearby
businesses, including a family oriented restaurant and a jewelry store.

Some communities have run methadone clinics out of town entirely.
Surrey, B.C., a Vancouver suburb with a drug problem of its own,
cranked up business-licence fees from $195 to $10,000 a year for
methadone clinics in 2002. That's a foolish reaction. Still, some
sensitivity is called for.

The operators of the Ottawa clinic made no friends by leaving
neighbours with the impression they were opening a regular health
clinic. A solution might be to integrate drug treatment into the
nearby Centretown Community Health Centre to take advantage of their
experience dealing with marginalized members of society.

Above all, people need a promise from the city, police and the
clinic's operators that it will be monitored closely, and swift
corrective action taken if its patients cause problems.