(UPDATE: Feb. 15 @ 5:55 am): Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) has said it is nixing a plan to open a standalone drug consumption site in Richmond.
It comes after the city's council approved a motion to explore the proposal despite two days of protests.
One of those protests ended up bringing national, and international, attention to Richmond after a woman who was in favour of the site appeared to tell a man who was opposed to "go back to Hong Kong."
VCH said late Wednesday that, based on the latest public health data, such a facility would not be the most appropriate service for drug users in the community.
It noted that the Richmond Local Health Area is reporting a comparatively low rate of drug toxicity deaths, adding that those numbers are slowly coming down.
VCH said it will continue to work with the city to bolster other overdose prevention services.
– With files from Canadian Press
(Original story: Feb. 14 @ 10 am): The next step for a controversial supervised drug consumption site has been approved by council members in Richmond after two days of highly charged hearings.
The council voted seven to two late Tuesday to pass a motion in favour of exploring the possibility of establishing a site with Vancouver Coastal Health.
Council issued a statement before the vote to address what it called "a large amount of misinformation and misunderstanding" about the motion, saying it is ultimately up to the health authority to decide if the site will be established.
The council said it can't "actually open or operate" a drug consumption site, stressing the decision "lies with Health Canada and Vancouver Coastal Health."
It added: "It will be up to VCH to decide whether such a site is in the interests of public health and safety and develop an application to Health Canada accordingly."
The council also stressed that staff at such sites "do not hand out drugs to users but provide access to addiction treatment and recovery services."
More than 100 people signed up to speak to the motion, many of them opposed to the possibility of a city supervised consumption site in response to the escalating number of illicit drug overdose deaths in the province.
The council meeting was peppered with shouting by some of the attendees of "no drugs" and "shame on you," while several councillors rebuked the protesters’ behaviour.
Richmond currently has no supervised consumption sites, which allow people to administer their own drugs under the watch of health workers.
Radical activist spews racist tirade against a Chinese man trying to protect kids from a drug injection site the NDP & Liberal governments are forcing into Richmond.
Help me fight against the NDP/Liberals pushing drugs on the Chinese community: https://t.co/P8nBHS1NEb pic.twitter.com/QdCXE4YJRm
— Pierre Poilievre (@PierrePoilievre) February 13, 2024
Video posted on social media shows tense confrontations between supporters and opponents of the sites at Richmond City Hall.
The issued has garnered the attention of a number of high−profile politicians, including federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who posted a video of a confrontation on social media platform X, saying it was an attack on a man trying to protect his kids from a drug injection site.
Poilievre said the video showed a "radical activist" spewing a "racist tirade against a Chinese man."
The video appears to show a woman shouting "you don't belong here" and "go back to Hong Kong" to a protester.
She also appears to tell him: "You're what's wrong with Canada."
John Rustad, who leads the Conservative Party of BC (which is not connected to Poilievre's party), also rejected the opening of the site in Richmond.
He said the city is "done with the NDP myth of safe drugs," adding that his party will "stop gov[ernment] drugs and end the chaos."
Premier David Eby, meanwhile, said "the discussion in Richmond is clearly about how any proposed site would operate, whether there would be impact on the community and in fact whether the site is needed."
BC United Leader Kevin Falcon said the NDP has shown "a complete disregard" for the concerns of Richmond residents," adding: "BC United will fix this situation."
Falcon told NowMedia last week that he wants to see “purpose-built institutions” in the province for people with “untreated, severe mental health” problems.
He added that, “if necessary,” people would have to be taken off the streets “involuntarily.”
He also said the drugs crisis in BC is “the worst we’ve ever seen in the history of the province.”
– With files from Canadian Press
