Vancouver’s newly elected Mayor Kennedy Stewart is asking his four-party council for their trust as he moves forward with a broadly worded motion for a new opioid task force.
In the final hours of the half-day inaugural Policy and Strategic Priorities meeting, the ten-day-old council agreed that Vancouver’s opioid crisis requires fast action. But debates over the lack of details on the force’s membership and budget—coupled with concerns over police presence in the Downtown Eastside—added hours to the session.
When addressing the transparency missing from his memo, Stewart argued it was an act of political expediency. “I’d just like to save some people before Christmas,” Kennedy said. The deadline of the holiday break appeared to weigh heavy on the mayor—who hopes to ask for more financial aid from provincial and federal levels based on the task forces findings.
“I’m worried that if we focus too much on the big picture, it will stop us from doing some of the small things that really matter,” Steward said, reminding the room that the opioid crisis claims one life daily in Vancouver.
Mayjor Kennedy Stewart argued for expediency in launching a new opioid task force. (Photo: Kennedy Stewart on Twitter)
The two speakers still present by the end of the evening, Jordan Westfall and a man who referred to himself as Homeless Dave, argued that Vancouver doesn’t need another task force. They say the only way to affect serious change would be through decriminalizing drugs, but the Vancouver City Charter prevents the municipal government from acting on that request beyond advocating for it.
Sarah Blyth—who unsuccessfully ran for council this year—is one of the city’s most recognizable activists in the opioid crisis. She was working a solo shift at the at the Overdose Prevention Society, the life-saving organization she created, otherwise she would have been there to speak. Because Vancouver already has an opioid task force, Community Action Team, Blyth argues there needs to be an implementation force to put current recommendations to the test. “You see a lot of funding coming in to stop the crisis, but if the funding isn’t spent in the right ways it’s not really useful.”
Blyth is referring to City Council’s unanimous vote on Tuesday to ask the province for more opioid response funding in direct response to Vancouver’s newest figures of suspected overdoses. So far this year, a total of 312 people have died in our city--a figure similar to the death toll at this time last year.
“You see a lot of funding coming in to stop the crisis, but if the funding isn’t spent in the right ways it’s not really useful.”She argues that Vancouver allotted an inordinate amount of the $3.5 million dollars in opioid response funding to the Vancouver Police Department when Gregor Robertson was mayor. “I don’t think police should be involved in this health crisis. Any kind of situation they’re involved in on the Downtown Eastside...They ask for names, information and suddenly a health issue escalates into an investigation.” Police stigmatization and the criminalization of drug users is why COPE councillor Jean Swanson refused to back down on amendments made to Stewart’s motion. After several edits to the wording—during which Swanson completed many rows of knitting—these amendments require staff to include community concerns over police officer’s treatment of drug users in their recommendations.
