VANCOUVER MAYOR RELEASES PLAN TO COMBAT DRUG ABUSE

Approach Based On 'Users Are Sick, Pushers Are Evil'

VANCOUVER -- Mayor Philip Owen released a bold, unprecedented discussion
paper yesterday to deal with drug abuse that he believes could serve as a
framework for the country.

"This is probably one of the most comprehensive documents ever put forward
anywhere in North America and it's an accumulation of what we've learned
over the last 21/2 years," Owen told a news conference.

He said the city has borrowed from other models in Portland, Ore.,
Frankfurt and Liverpool and Switzerland.

The document includes 31 recommendations at a cost of up to $30 million.

The discussion paper advocates a four-pillar approach including prevention,
treatment, enforcement and harm reduction, and is open to public scrutiny
until spring 2001.

It advocates drug courts that would put users into treatment instead of
jail, housing support and efforts to target organized crime, drug dealers
and drug houses.

The plan also calls for a redeployment of police officers to the city's
downtown eastside, where open drug use is rampant, and day centres for drug
users outside that area.

Owen said he's discussed the problem of drug abuse with federal and
provincial health ministers and mayors across Canada.

"Our approach is, fundamentally, that users are sick and the pushers are
evil and the people dealing in human misery should be dealt with very
harshly and that's going to require the attorney general and the minister
of justice in Ottawa," Owen said.

"Our view at city hall is that to do nothing with illegal narcotics in our
city is not an option," he said. "We just cannot ignore this any longer."

Jurisdictions around the country are looking to Vancouver's "watershed"
document to deal with their own problems involving illegal narcotics, Owen
said.

He said the mayors of Yokohama, Japan, and Seattle, Wash., have also shown
interest in what Vancouver is proposing.

Owen was initially reticent when asked if he supports a safe drug injection
site, saying a comprehensive approach is needed and that senior levels of
government must take responsibility by ensuring services are available
across municipalities.

But when pressed further, he said he's not personally in favour of a safe
injection site, such as Geneva's infamous Needle Park, which he said has
attracted 25,000 drug users from around Europe.

Such a site in Vancouver would be a magnet for drug addicts from across the
country, he said, citing Alberta residents in particular.

Owen said the document will be controversial but that the drug crisis
that's claimed so many lives and comprises 12,000 injection users in
Greater Vancouver requires a radical plan.

Donald MacPherson, the drug policy coordinator for the city of Vancouver,
said 25 per cent of the city's drug users are also HIV-positive or have
hepatitis C.

Illegal drug use is also linked to crime and costs society millions of
dollars, with $7.5 million a year just in hospital costs, MacPherson said.