DRUG ABUSE IN KELOWNA EXAMINED

Depending on who you ask, Kelowna has either a raging street drug
problem or no problem at all.

As usual, the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

"It's progressing," said Melody Russell, a long-time heroin addict
from Kelowna. "It's pretty bad but I wouldn't say it's out of control.
But if you don't do anything, it will get out of control."

Russell and her friend Jenny Henderson, also an addict, will bring
their unique perspective to the mayor's public forum on community
safety and harm reduction next week at the Rotary Centre for the Arts.

As part of the forum panel, Henderson and Russell, both just three
months clean, will get a chance to help shape public policy on these
two issues.

And like the city itself, they are of two minds with Russell
supporting safe injection sites and Henderson giving them the thumbs
down.

"I don't support them," Henderson said. "If the working girls go
there, the guys will just follow and make life hell for them."

Russell, on the other hand, would support a safe injection site for
Kelowna, similar to that introduced to Vancouver in October.

"If someone is going to overdose, they can get help right there and I
say this from my own experience," she said.

"If you need to use paraphernalia, it's ready and available and it's
clean."

The two women agree, however, that Kelowna is sadly lacking in
addictions services.

"It's sad. There's no programs or any kind of support for street
people and addicts and alcoholics," said Henderson.

"If you're going to get them off the street, then you have to have
places where they can go."

Henderson and Russell will be joined on the panel by Sgt. Doug Lang
from the Vancouver City Police; former Vancouver mayor Philip Owen;
Inspector Bill McKinnon, Kelowna RCMP; Debra Gray, public health
nurse; Pat Townsley, manager of alcohol and drugs services with the
Interior Health Authority; Kathleen Wood, Outreach Health Services;
Daryle Roberts, AIDS Resource Centre; and Catherine Williams Jones,
NOW Canada Society.

Organizers of the forum want to focus on the so-called Four Pillars
approach which espouses prevention, treatment, enforcement and harm
reduction which they claim has been used successfully in other countries.

The community forum begins at 9 a.m. Nov. 26 at the Mary Irwin Theater
in the performing arts centre on Cawston Avenue, across from Skyreach
Place. For more information, contact Brian Mairs at 862-2481.