CLARKE'S DRUG VIEWS BELONG IN THE ARCHIVES

In the likely event that Jennifer Clarke becomes the next mayor of
Vancouver, she will be the first NPA mayor in 15 years to send this city's
drug policy sharply into reverse.

When Gordon Campbell had the job in the '80s, he championed the first free
needle exchange, following a report from the province's chief coroner, Vince
Cain, into the alarming number of drug overdose deaths and spread of disease
through used needles on the Downtown Eastside. A decade later, Philip Owen
embraced the idea of harm reduction in a drug policy he calls a "four pillar
approach."

By then, the spread of HIV-AIDS among injection drug users was epidemic and
street prostitution and property crime by junkies was on the rise, plaguing
the whole region. As a result, we reached a collective conclusion to stop
treating addicts as criminals and start treating them as people with serious
health problems.

Europe, Britain and Australia were far ahead of us. Junkies there were
counselled rather than jailed and safe shooting sites were set up to get
addicts off the street and injecting their drugs under the supervision of
health care professions. Now, those countries are looking at distributing
heroin to junkies on a limited bases.

It's in part because of the impact of the criminal element in drug
distribution that mayor Owen says he wants marijuana decriminalized. "If
there was a vote, I'd vote to decriminalize it," he told me. But more to the
point, he has also supported safe shooting sites and trials to distribute
heroin to addicts on a limited basis.

Now we get to mayor-apparent Jennifer Clarke, who promises that if she's
elected, we'll see a New Generation of Leadership. Clarke has profited most
from the showdown between Owen and the NPA backroom gang that pushed him
out, in large part over his drug policy.

In the spring of 2000, Owen was getting favourable headlines for his
four-pillar approach and NPA councillor Lynne Kennedy was heading off to
Liverpool to check out an innovative heroin maintenance program. Clarke,
typically, figured it was in the best interest of her political future that
she pick up on some of this stuff. She convinced council to foot the bill -
$1,081 - for her to travel from Amsterdam, where she was on vacation, to the
European drug rehabilitation haven of Frankfurt, Germany.

She did a little dog and pony show for council on her return in the fall,
typically avoiding any conclusions. Until now that is.

Now that she's discovered a convenient constituency in the small but
influential Community Alliance, which holds the NPA captive by controlling
the board, Clarke has found her tongue.

She damns Owen's drug policy with the faintest of praise, calling it a good
"conceptual framework." She says before there are safe injection sites, more
money should be put in rehabilitation. Almost every health care professional
in the Western world has pointed out that safe injection sites, regardless
of other services to addicts, will save lives and reduce costs to the
system. As well, treatment facilities have improved significantly in
Vancouver in the past two years.

Safe shooting sites are seen as part of treatment, even though the drugs are
acquired through illegal means. Indeed, while Clarke may cringe at the
thought, there is already a safe shooting site at the Dr. Peter Centre for
the treatment of HIV-AIDS. Nurses there simply consider it part of their
responsibility to reduce risk of disease and death by overseeing injection
procedures.

What is most interesting about Clarke's New Generation of Leadership is that
the world has passed her by. New safe shooting sites are being considered in
Toronto, Montreal, Quebec City, Victoria and Ottawa. On Thursday, council
will have the opportunity to support this latest project, already
unanimously endorsed by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and Owen.
Or it can shift into reverse and follow Clarke.