City council frustrated over lack of say on supervised consumption process
It appears it won’t be long before a supervised drug consumption site (SCS) is announced for Red Deer. But frustration lingers amongst members of city council over how much say they have on the matter.
Stacey Carmichael, Executive Director for Turning Point, told city council Tuesday night that their current location is most preferred for a few reasons: Turning Point was chosen by Alberta Health to lead a recently-completed needs assessment, they have been the local experts for 30 years, and they already have capacity and established relationships in their current location.
“There seems to be bit of a disconnect in the understanding between what the province was asking for and what the municipality felt that they needed to provide,” says Carmichael, who adds she’d be surprised if the province didn’t approve supervised consumption for Red Deer. “The province acknowledges the willingness of the municipality as broader than just the City and council, so the opinions of people who use drugs, other service providers. Those types of things make up the willingness of the municipality. I’ve never felt like our provincial or federal governments want to just dismiss our municipal government, but obviously they [council] feel otherwise.”
Councillors Buck Buchanan, Tanya Handley and Ken Johnston all said it would be great if city council felt like they had a greater say on the issue, being that the province has the final say over where SCS will be located.