City of Powell River Council will consider renewing a lease with Lift Community Services for operation of the overdose prevention site (OPS) near Duncan Street.
At the April 2 city council meeting, city director of properties, development and communications Scott Randolph said on June 1, 2019, the city entered into a lease agreement for $1 with the Powell River Employment Society, now known as Lift Community Services, for the operation of an overdose prevention site. He said the lease was for 10 months and expired on March 31.
“Council has had some discussions around this to seek direction on whether or not the city should consider renewing the lease with Lift Community Services of qathet Society for the operation of the overdose prevention site,” said Randolph. “Staff was directed to negotiate the renewal of the agreement based on several items.
“One was the attainment of a community wellness and harm-reduction grant to address issues such as the establishment of more sharps containers and increased sweeps of the OPS for discarded needles around the area, and better consultation and communication between the society and the neighbours of the OPS.”
Randolph said on March 9, it was released that Powell River had successfully attained a community wellness and harm reduction grant from the community crisis innovation fund through the ministry of health and administered by the community action initiative in partnership with the ministry of mental health and addictions’ overdose emergency response centre. He added that this funding will assist in further supporting activities of the Powell River OPS.
“In addition to this, the society has worked on establishing better communications with its neighbours and recently provided council with a full briefing on the overdose prevention site in the public portion of the committee of the whole meeting held on February 18,” said Randolph. “Unless directed otherwise by council, the lease will continue to only be for $1. At this point in time, I think we are just asking that this move on to the next council meeting for approval.”
Councillor Maggie Hathaway said it has been a rocky road because there are people for and against the OPS. She said Lift has done an excellent job trying to communicate with those who have issues with the site. She said the new funding has been received so there will be more people trying to do sweeps of the area and making sure there are no needles left around.
Sharps containers will be placed so needles can be disposed of appropriately rather than thrown on the ground, she added.
“In light of the new pandemic, it has been overshadowed but there has been a provincial health emergency declared on overdose and that is still in effect,” said Hathaway. “The OPS has been successful and the overdose deaths have decreased; there have been several lives saved at the prevention centre.
“I’m happy to support this for another year. I know not everyone will be happy with this. We will do our very best to make sure it operates so as not to cause any uproar in the immediate neighbourhood. It’s essential we continue with it for another year.”
Councillor Jim Palm said this is something every municipality has to deal with.
“It’s prevalent wherever you live; it’s very unfortunate that we do have to deal with this but it’s just one of the pieces of society that needs to be dealt with.” said Palm. “When you look around our community and look at other communities, I hear horror stories where these types of sites have gone in and they are close to well-established neighbourhoods and have led to a number of thefts in the areas. This one being in the centre of town has its own difficulties. We’ve consulted and hopefully calmed down some of the unrest that’s out there in that vicinity.”
Palm said he was happy to see extra steps are being taken on needle pickup, and that consultation was done with the business community in that area.
“I’m happy to say we’re dealing with the issue in Powell River and I thank councillor Hathaway for all of her fine work, and Lift Community Services,” he added.
Councillor Rob Southcott said this has been part of the social structure in BC and as a paramedic, he has dealt with the issue here and in other places. He said he was grateful for the substantial support coming from the province to give this community the ability to manage the challenge.
Council will vote on the issue at its April 9 meeting.
