CATERING TO DRUG ADDICTS

Vancouverites Hotly Polarized Over Drug Conference, And Whether City Should
Help Users Get Their Fix

Bob Bentall, whose family-owned business has assets of $2-billion, is
spending a lot of time these days thinking about drugs: crack,cocaine and
heroin.

I'm trying to understand. It's about my education as much as anything,"
says Mr.Bentall, sitting in his office in one of the cluster of five towers
in downtown Vancouver that carry the Bentall name.

This week Mr. Bentall, his wife, Lynda, and two police officers will host
an international conference that targets the illicit drug problem, but
their conference has itself become the focus of protests.

Mr. Bentall has set off an angry debate that has been smouldering for years
in Vancouver: whether to pursue the war on drugs or adopt a "harm
reduction" approach that would see the government set up and run clinics
where addicts can go to inject drugs safely.

Tensions over the issue are running high in Vancouver. The IDEAS
conference will be greeted by noisy protest rallies, a march through the
streets and a marijuana smoke-in where people will be encouraged to sample
25 different brands of "B.C. bud."

One church in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside recently opened a model
"safe-shooting" site, complete with everything except drugs, to show the
public what it would look like.

But no real clinics have yet opened in Canada and the debate over the drug
injection sites is far from over. The issue has split politicians at City
Hall and has pitted merchants against advocates for harm reduction. Those
supporting safe injection sites include reformed addicts, medical experts,
and high-ranking politicians.

Dr. Perry Kendall, the provincial health officer, recently told city
council he favours safe injection sites. "I think it's the best chance
that the city has to deal with the injection drug use and substance use
problem," he said as council considered a motion proposing support for
supervised drug use facilities.

At the same meeting, Sue Bennett, a member of the Gastown Community Safety
Society, pleaded with council not to encourage more drug use in the area.

"This is just another hook to go in the community. The community needs
relief from addicts," she said.

Coincidentally, council will conclude its debate this week, while the IDEAS
conference is underway across town.

Mr. Bentall said he has an open mind on the issue of drug treatment and the
conference is meant to promote discussion and understanding, not advance a
single point of view.

"Speaking personally," he adds, "I support...education, law enforcement and
treatment for the addicted. But I am against harm reduction and helping
people pump more poison into their system."

He says the growing clamour for harm reduction has drowned out debate,
which he says leaves him deeply concerned. "We need to hear the other
side...there needs to be a healthy debate."

In Vancouver, over the past few years, the talk has increasingly been about
harm reduction, an idea that has been endorsed by Phiilip Owen, the Mayor,
although it has been recently questioned by Jennifer Clarke, the leading
contender for his job.

Mr. Bentall thinks harm reduction is the signal for a slide into
permissiveness. Conference material reflects that view, with a list of
questions that suggest its participants will hear a harder line on drugs
than is currently popular.

"Why are there so many illegal drugs available in Canada?" the organizers
ask in conference material. "Why can't we stop drug pushers and pot
growers? Why do most of our treatment programs not work?" How can we stoop
the drug situation from becoming hopeless?"

Who is influencing Canada's decisions towards permissiveness?

Speakers include Calvina Fay, Executive Director of Drug Free America
Foundation, Dr. Ernst Aeschbach, of Swiss Physicians Against Drugs, and
Christy McCampbell, Chief of California's Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement.

"By sharing resources, knowledge and experience, the aim of IDEAS 2002 is
to educate as many Canadians as possible about the threat of permissive
drug laws. The goal is to bring an end to tolerance for substance abuse
that enslaves so many of our fellow citizens and profits only traffickers,
criminals and terrorist," says conference brochure.

Such provocative language has not escaped the notice of the B.C. Marijuana
Party, a group that has long called for an official end to the war on drugs
and adoption of more lenient policies, including the legalization of
marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and other substances.

The Marijuana Party, which attempted to influence the political agenda by
running candidates in the last provincial election, will hold protest
rallies outside the convention hall. Protesters will be encouraged to
"Just say no to bad IDEAS."

Marc Emery, the party president, will declare his candidacy in the next
fall's mayoralty race on the day the conference opens. He thinks the
Bentall's are mean-spirited, backwards and part of the "propaganda machine"
of Drug Free America Inc. "I'm surprised the prohibitionists even need a
conference, given the way our laws are being so strictly enforced," he said.

Mr. Emery said the conference is aimed at promoting the Swedish model,
where drug users get an average sentence of 20 months, as compared to five
months in Canada. "They want 20 months, I want zero months," he said.

"I believe in legalizing all these drugs. We should be delivering the
heroin to [addicts]. The best safe injection site is in their own
home...We're supporting this fabulous drug underworld by making it illegal."

Mr. Emery said the conference is being staged by "a petty, sadistic group"
that wants to punish drug users, instead of helping them. Mr. Bentall has
heard the criticism, but says it will not deter him. The issue, he said,
is too important not to be talked about.

The idea for the symposium came about when he and his wife sat at lunch one
day with Al Arsenault and Toby Hinton, two Vancouver police officers who
walk the beat in the Downtown Eastside.

Constables Arsenault and Hinton are minor celebrities because of the
efforts they have made over the years to educate the public about drugs in
an urban area with one of the worst substance abuse problems in the world.

The Bentalls turned to them because of their growing personal worries about
the spread of drugs in society.

The Bentalls have for 12 years run a unique program in the Eastside, the
Ailanthus Achievement Centre for Inner-City Youth, which takes
under-privileged kids and tries to guide them away from endemic poverty
toward successful lives. The goal for participants is college or university
graduation.

The program, funded and run by the Bentalls, provides children with food,
clothing, tutorial help and financial assistance while involving them in
performing arts programs meant to build self-esteem. The children they
work with often come from families where drug abuse is a crippling problem,
and the Ailanthus Centre is located in an area where drug use is common.

Mr. Bentall said he and his wife have witnessed first-hand the damage done
by drugs - and they have lost faith in the effectiveness of existing
approaches.

"We have one student whose father was in and out of drug treatment programs
17 times," Mr. Bentall said. "That's a huge burden for that child, and
it's got to tell you something is wrong with the treatment program. I mean
17 times?"

Across the street from Ailanthus Centre is the Compassion Club, an
operation that gives out marijuana for medicinal purposes. A few doors up
is a methadone clinic. Across the street is a park where heroin users
shoot up, often leaving their needles where children play.

Mr. Bentall said it is a routine job, at the Ailanthus Centre, to clean up
vomit left in the doorways by drug addicts.

He said he and his wife had lunch with the two Vancouver officers in the
hope they could learn something from them. "we were talking about the
drug problems ... and somebody said, "Well, why don't we do something about
it?", he said.

"This is a one-time deal," he said, "This isn't something we're going to
put on all the time. But I hope it helps shift the debate and the
direction this country is going.

"Drug abuse is a very serious problem in Canada today. It just saps the
vitality of our nation. And if we continue the way we're going, in 20
years time we'll be living in gated communities."

Mr. Emery scoffs at the Bentalls, and predicts their conference, which
starts Wednesday, will change nothing.

"After that conference is finished there's a hydroponics conference in
there, in the same hotel," Mr. Emery said happily. "That's all about
marijuana grow ops...and it will be attended by thousands."