MAYORS, SENATOR HONOURED FOR DRUG POLICY

Vancouver Mayor Larry Campbell and former mayor Philip Owen were
honoured Friday by an American organization that promotes
compassionate drug policy.

Campbell, Owen and Senator Pierre Claude Nolin were given the Richard
J. Dennis Drugpeace Award for outstanding achievement in the field of
drug policy by the Drug Policy Alliance at a conference in New Jersey.
It is the first time in the 14-year history of the award that it has
been given to Canadians.

Owen led Vancouver's "four-pillar" approach to drug use and, with the
later involvement of Campbell, managed to open North America's first
legal safe injection site.

Nolin chaired the Canadian Senate's special committee on illegal
drugs, which last year called for the legalization and regulation of
cannabis in Canada.

Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance,
commended the trio for "following the western European model of
pragmatic and humane reform."

"We need more leaders like them in the U.S.," Nadelmann
said.

The Drug Policy Alliance is a U.S.-based non-profit organization that
promotes new drug policies based on science, compassion, health and
human rights.