Pubdate: Tue, 06 Dec 2005
Source: Vancouver Sun (CN BC)
Copyright: 2005 The Vancouver Sun
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/vancouver/vancouversun/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/477
Author: Frances Bula

TREAT ADDICTION AS 'DISABILITY': MAYOR

Sullivan Wants To Talk Drugs With Harper

Drug addiction is a disability that needs management rather than 
being considered an illness or a crime, Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan 
said Monday.

"Is drug addiction a sickness? A short-term problem you fix?" 
Sullivan said in his inaugural address to council.

"Or does it more resemble a disability -- a long-term problem you 
manage? I believe it is the latter," he said. "We must be more 
aggressive developing strategies for management rather than leaving 
this problem in the hands of organized crime."

It was Sullivan's strongest statement since the beginning of his 
victorious mayoral election campaign about the need for a new 
approach to drug addiction, and he went further than either of his 
predecessors, Larry Campbell or Philip Owen.

Sullivan also said he wants to "have a conversation" with 
Conservative leader Stephen Harper to convince Harper of the value of 
the city's controversial safe injection site, in the wake of comments 
Harper made on the weekend about drug use.

In a speech in Burnaby during a stop in the federal election 
campaign, Harper vowed to crack down on drugs by imposing stiffer 
penalties, and he criticized former mayor Campbell's soft stance on drugs.

"We as a government will not use taxpayers' money to fund drug use. 
That is not the strategy we will pursue," Harper said, raising the 
question of whether a Conservative federal government would cut 
funding to Vancouver's safe-injection site.

"I don't believe it was the best thing for me to hear," Sullivan said 
Monday of Harper's comments, "but I would like to discuss it with 
him. I would try to convince him otherwise," said Sullivan.

Although it is the provincial government, not the federal government, 
that has provided the basic operating money for the safe-injection 
site, the federal government's role is key because the site needs an 
exemption from the federal health ministry in order to allow 
currently illegal drugs on the premises. The federal government also 
provided $1.5 million for research and evaluation costs over the 
first three years.
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman