REAGAN'S DRUG PLAN RISES AGAIN

Councillor To Roll Out Crime-Fighting Plan

Councillor Michael Thompson, who will unveil today his plan to combat drugs
and violence, says the call for safe injection sites such as those in
Vancouver, above, will "divert a huge amount of time and attention in 2004
from getting people off drugs." Councillor Kyle Rae says the sites are
helping fight drug abuse.

Give Councillor Michael Thompson full marks for initiative. The recently
elected municipal rep for Ward 37 (Scarborough Centre) is not wasting any
time making the folks at City Hall aware of his political priorities and
seeking their support for his agenda.

But when Thompson holds a news conference this morning to unveil "an action
plan to deal with drugs, gangs, guns and street violence" in Toronto,
there's at least one councillor who will not be on hand to applaud the
proposal. Councillor Kyle Rae is adamant that his colleague will cause more
problems than he hopes to solve with a misguided attack on substance abuse
that ignores programs that have been proven successful in Europe and are in
the process of being adopted elsewhere in Canada.

"I would hate to see someone come up with a three-pager thinking they can
solve the drug problem when we've got a history in the City of Toronto of
working very effectively with the drug-addicted population and helping them
through their addictions," Rae said yesterday in response to a three-page,
pre-Christmas memo Thompson sent to Mayor David Miller and members of
council's policy and finance committee.

What particularly irked the councillor for Ward 27 (Toronto
Centre-Rosedale) was the Scarborough pol's dismissal of the "safe room"
programs that Rae has seen up close during work-related visits to Amsterdam
and Frankfurt. A similar project with considerable federal government
involvement is now under way in Vancouver, where heroin addiction is a
major problem.

"We need specific measures to get people off drugs and [to] become healthy,
productive citizens again," Thompson said in his missive seeking committee
support for his action plan.

"That can only happen if the person is treated and not left to die a slow,
agonizing death in a chemical cocktail of despair, poverty and misery," he
added. "Unfortunately, one issue that will divert a huge amount of time and
attention in 2004 from getting people off drugs will be the call for
'supervised drug injection' sites. We have finite resources, budgets, staff
and health facilities, however, and our first priority should always be to
get the person off drugs and into treatment -- not perpetuate the problem."

Rae doesn't dispute Thompson's contention that "the underlying root causes
behind guns, gangs and violence on Toronto streets are drugs." But, he
argued: "You're not going to draw people in and get them to stop using
their drug of preference by just telling them what Nancy Reagan told them
to do.

"Clearly, Nancy Reagan failed," the downtown councillor added. "The drug
problem in the States hasn't changed. Just saying 'No' is not going to stop
it. You need a more sophisticated approach. Yes, it may be more costly. It
may make you feel queasy, morally. But if you really are seriously
interested in changing the drug culture, you have to go in and provide it.
You have to provide a safe place, and you provide the counselling to help
people make a wiser choice to give it up. Even with tobacco -- one of the
most addictive drugs -- you wean smokers off of it with the patch. It's a
harm-reduction process. "

Rae pointed to the needle exchange program instituted by the old city of
Toronto health board more than a decade ago as an example of local
government innovation that has paid dividends by reducing the spread of
hepatitis C and HIV.

"As a result of reducing the use of shared needles, we've been able to make
great inroads in having a safer, healthier population of drug addicts," he
maintained. "I can't imagine city council walking away from programs that
help safeguard the health of the population." Which, Rae argued, is exactly
what council would be doing if it rejected the concept of supervised
injection sites on Thompson's say-so.

That said, he agrees with his colleague's contention that senior levels of
government have to get more involved in helping Toronto deal with the
scourge that drugs are inflicting on the city.

"With a new council and new federal and provincial direction, it is time to
work together and achieve results," Thompson declared. "Nothing will happen
on this issue without a work plan, budget and a timetable. We need all three."

Like I was saying: Full marks for initiative.