Drugs and the Law

One of the priorities of Victoria City Council is focused on harm reduction - treating drug addiction as a disease, and less as a law eforcement issue.

We don't have a lot of tools to advance this agenda, but we can act as advocates for a more sensisble policy approach to drugs and addiction issues.

We have put funding into health services for our street population, many of whom have addiction problems, and we have been working hard to increase the supply of affordable and supportive housing that can help people off of the street, often the first step towards helping people deal with addictions.

I'll write more about housing in another post because I think it's worth noting how much work we've done on the issue, but for now I'd like to direct you to another sensible voice.

I noticed that Victoria police officer David Bratzer signed up to this blog, and whenever I've seen his name in print, it's usually associated with his work on ending prohibition. Drug wars are an expensive policy failure that we need to consign to the dustbin of history. Doing so would leave us with more resources to deal with criminal issues that matter or so many other things that are more valuable than pouring money into the burdens of drug enforcement - like too much police time, too busy court dockets and too many crowbar hotels.

Here's an article David wrote for the Georgia Straight last year. Keep up the good work!
http://www.straight.com/article-206649/cop-calls-legalize-drugs