City Council’s bill limiting supervised injection sites didn’t go far enough

Philadelphia has long been ground zero for America’s heroin fixation, and in recent years, as overdose deaths have mounted, progressives have pushed for safe injection sites — places where medical personnel can watch and intervene if a drug user is in danger of dying.

Proponents of the idea cite studies and statistics indicating that thousands of lives have been saved as a result of such sites. In Philadelphia, however, where Kensington stands as a monument to the true nature of addiction, it’s safe to say that most people remain unconvinced. That’s why City Council was confident it was good politics to pass what seemed to be a ban on the sites. In truth, it wasn’t a ban at all. It was a Band-Aid.

The legislation, authored by 7th District Councilmember Quetcy Lozada, prohibits safe injection sites in all but one councilmanic district. However, an organization seeking to open such a site can appeal for an exception, triggering a process where the organization would have to seek community support. Then, after the community and the district’s councilmember weighed in, the Zoning Board of Adjustment would make a decision.

In essence, the bill gives the community a voice. As someone who lives, works, and communicates daily with my fellow Philadelphians, I know what they will say when they have a chance to speak. They don’t want safe injection sites in their communities, and neither do I.

Councilmember Jamie Gauthier, who supports what she calls “overdose prevention sites,” represents the only councilmanic district that is not covered by the legislation.

Gauthier told me in an interview on WURD Radio that she excluded her West and Southwest Philadelphia district from the bill so that residents there could decide for themselves.

Given that the bill literally creates a pathway for people to have a voice in the process, that explanation doesn’t hold water. After Gauthier told me she didn’t discuss it with people in her district before deciding to oppose the bill, her rationale seemed even flimsier.

I can’t say whether Gauthier intended to silence her constituents on the issue. But according to Lozada, any district not included in the bill can have a safe injection site placed within its boundaries without community input.

That’s wrong, and the people of West Philadelphia must articulate that truth. If they don’t, they could end up with the same kinds of problems that plague Kensington. Lozada knows those issues well because she began working on them 15 years ago with former Councilmember Maria Quiñones Sánchez.

“I think that on a day-to-day, our community is faced with having to put up with the fact that you have 700 to 1,000 people, depending on who is doing the count, that are living on the street, that are living in the community, that are affecting their quality of life,” Lozada told me in a radio interview. “They’re affecting how we do business in our district. The commerce in the 7th Council District, along the Kensington corridor, has just about died out because they’re impacted so negatively by the people who are living there.

“It’s also very sad to see. You see people who have lost complete hope in themselves. They live to use drugs. They live in active — very severe active addiction. And they’re lost. And that’s not what we want for our community. That’s not what we want our children to see or to believe that that is the way to live. These people are walking around with open wounds. They’re stealing from the residents.”

None of this is surprising to me, and this reality, along with my own experience, is at the root of my opposition to safe injection sites.

You don’t help people with an addiction use their drug of choice. That’s not harm reduction. It’s enabling.

After nearly 27 years clean from an addiction to crack cocaine, I know a few things about drugs. I know that you don’t help people with an addiction use their drug of choice. That’s not harm reduction. It’s enabling. I know you shouldn’t discourage them from trying to get clean. That’s not a way out. It’s a cop-out.

If Gauthier is going to help West Philadelphia navigate the opioid crisis, she must stand with the people as she’s done on other issues. As an elected representative, she owes them that much.