Victoria Vice [updated]

Victoria Police and PEERS did separate canvassing to determine the number of underage sex workers on the Downtown stroll.

Two former sex-workers conducted the survey at various locations and times in the first week of September. They finished the second part of the survey last week.

“It’s been the last while that it’s really skyrocketed,” said Kelly Ransome, 32, a night outreach worker and former sexually exploited youth.

But Victoria police only found two underage youth in a three-week survey they conducted from Aug. 14 to Sept 4.

Both were between 16 and 18 years old.

The numbers don’t agree but both would concur that there are sex workers under the age of 19 working Victoria’s streets. This comes on the heels of the recent conviction of a customer who killed a Duncan-born prostitute in Vancouver. Meanwhile we seem to be no closer to improving life on the streets for sex workers. B.C. prostitutes remain prey for the disturbed, whether it be the simple-minded pig farmer or the international billionaire.

Maybe it’s time to look seriously at Victoria artist Bob Wise’s The Office: A Portable Amenity Kiosk for Female Outdoor Sex Workers.

I discussed Amsterdam’s experiment with cracking down on “vice” here.

UPDATE: Jody Paterson examines our outdated laws on prostitution in an Op-Ed piece in today’s Times Colonist.

Sex work is legal in Canada, yet everything required for a sale to take place is illegal — location, marketing, even the earnings. That renders the work just legal enough for men to be able to acquire paid sex anytime they like in any city, and just illegal enough to continue the pretense that Canadian society is hard at work trying to eradicate prostitution. What exactly IS the purpose of laws like that?
[...]
Read the research. Prostitution doesn’t increase when it’s decriminalized, because it’s already so well-entrenched in every community that there’s no increase in demand just because it’s legal. All the men who buy sex are already buying it.

Urinal finally installed

The long awaited permanent urinal was installed this week in Downtown Victoria at the corner of Pandora and Government Streets. I’ve written about this long saga in earlier posts but in short, the automatic pop-up urinals were deemed impractical and a modernized European-style “pissoir” was installed instead.

Time will tell if they are a success. Are they too exposed? Are they in an area that gets enough traffic?

Vic News: Needle Exchange location eyed

Victoria News
Needle exchange location eyed
By Roszan Holmen – Victoria News

Published: July 31, 2009 4:00 PM
Updated: July 31, 2009 4:12 PM

A building in the Burnside-Gorge neighbourhood has been singled out as the frontrunner for a new fixed needle-exchange site.

An agreement looks promising for the new pilot project, said Robert Randall, a member of the needle exchange advisory committee.

It’s been 14 months since the needle exchange on Cormorant Street closed. Ever since, the Vancouver Island Health Authority has been on the lookout for a replacement building.

Resistance from landlords has been a major reason why alternative sites fell through, Randall said. The landlord in the Burnside-Gorge building, however, likes the idea. “He supports the idea of harm reduction … To find a landlord OK with this is pretty amazing,” Randall said.

VIHA confirmed that one landowner has come forward with a proposal to house the facility.

“It’s our hope that this will be a viable location,” spokesperson Shannon Marshall said.

But work still needs to be done, she said.

First, the advisory committee needs to make a recommendation. Next, the broader community will be consulted.

Randall confirmed the potential site is in an industrial area.

Ideally, he said, the new location would be downtown, but that’s not realistic given budget cuts at VIHA and high lease rates in the core.

rholmen@saanichnews.com

Find this article at:
http://www.bclocalnews.com/vancouver_island_south/victorianews/news/52222537.html

Needle Exchange Update

VIHA has identified a potential new location for a fixed needle distribution site. It’s in the Burnside-Gorge neighbourhood just north of the Downtown border on Princess Street.

Members of the DRA have been part of VIHA’s Needle Exchange Advisory committee and its spin-off, the Site Selection Subcommittee. We find that this site–while far from perfect–meets many of the requirements a successful needle exchange needs.

The Times Colonist reports on it here, although it weighs heavily on the opinions expressed by members of SOLID (Society of Living Intravenous Drug users). It should be noted that the spokesperson for SOLID may not necessarily reflect the views of the SOLID Board or membership, let alone the opinions of Victoria’s drug users.

In a July 23 letter to the Vancouver Island Health Authority’s Needle Exchange Advisory Committee, a group calling itself SOLID — Society for Living Intravenous Drug Users — said a proposed site on Princess Street was inappropriate. No address was given.

The letter, a copy of which was obtained by the Times Colonist, said the area is known to drug users as “extremely dangerous and violent due to street gang activity,” and any attempt at extra policing would only scare away needle-exchange clients.

The area is a few steps away from Government Street’s prostitute stroll. I’m not aware of any other extraordinary “gang” activity here and I’m certain the Vic PD would agree.

SOLID, listed as a member of the Needle Exchange Advisory Committee, also said that the site was too far from downtown services, buildings were badly maintained and unsuitable for a health service and current tenants would have to be displaced.

The site is relatively close to needed services. The compactness of Downtown Victoria gives the illusion of being far. Superimpose Victoria’s services onto a map of Vancouver or any other large city and the distances appear much closer.

The houses need minimal upgrades to meet requirements according to VIHA–not much more than was done at their comparable Nanaimo exchange.

It’s true that current tenants will be displaced but the landlord assures us accomodation will be made at his other properties. Still, there would be a net loss of low-income housing.

The letter argues 941 Pandora Ave., the site of the old St. John’s Ambulance Society, is still the best site for a needle exchange.

But the exchange, and the accompanying drug trade, would destabilize the 900 block Pandora which is already at critical mass for chaos. The residents (including Our Place) deserve a home free from public disorder.

900 Block Pandora GNA

Times Colonist photo

This afternoon at the Victoria Conservatory of Music I (on behalf of the DRA) signed a Good Neighbour Agreement for the 900 block of Pandora. Other signees included VIHA, the VCM, Our Place, The City of Victoria, the North Park Neighbourhood Association and some of the retailers along the block, including McDonald’s. The Times Colonist reports here.

It was several months in the making and we hope it will help open lines of communication in this busy block.

Any Good Neighbour Agreement isn’t a magic bullet. Many things need to happen to ensure safety and vibrancy in a neighbourhood and a GNA is only a small part.

It does mean that everyone in the block takes some responsibility for ensuring the health of the street, from sidewalk cleaning to informing neighbours and police about criminal activity.

TC editorial: Inching closer to a urinal

Inching closer to a urinal

Times ColonistJune 12, 2009

It shouldn’t have taken three years, a cascade of council debates and uncounted sums of taxpayers’ money and city staff time to create a place for people to pee downtown.

The tortuous, expensive road to a decision on downtown urinals should embarrass councillors. Staff compiled lengthy reports on urinal options. The city called for tenders on high-tech, pop-up urinals that rose from the pavement at night then, like Batman, disappeared when daylight broke.

And then abandoned the idea. Portable urinals, hauled away at the end of the night, were tried, abandoned, tried again. And councillors talked and talked.

Now a decision has been made, almost, to spend $40,000 on what looks like a simple, relatively attractive way to deal with the main problem of men urinating late at night in doorways, alleys and anywhere else that takes their besotted fancies. Almost, because council still isn’t sure just where the urinals should go. Based on performance so far on this issue, that could consume another three years.

Or not. Mayor Dean Fortin and the new council have shown a welcome focus on getting things done and tackling a limited number of issues at a time.

The urinals appear useful, especially if their use is encouraged with aggressive ticketing for those who still insist on using the streets for bathrooms instead. They won’t be much help for women, but they aren’t the big problem anyway.

The solution isn’t cheap. Plan on spending $40,000 for the urinal — a semi-open affair that screens users’ bodies while leaving a clear view of heads and feet — and $40,000 in annual operating costs. That’s still reasonable compared with the alternative of dumping clean-up costs on downtown businesses and residents.

But is it reasonable that all taxpayers should be paying for the urinals? The successful experiment with portable toilets saw them used Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, a recognition that the problems resulted from crowds at downtown bars.

As this whole process limped forward in 2006, then-councillor Fortin suggested a five per cent beer tax to cover the costs. That might be unfair to responsible drinkers, but shifting the cost to bar owners would be fair — and it would be an incentive for them to look hard at ways of reducing excessive drinking and disorder.

We’ll offer congratulations to council for taking this useful step — once the urinal is in place and ready to go.
© Copyright (c) The Victoria Times Colonist

I weigh in on public urination and the opinions flow.

I was asked about the revised urinal idea on C-FAX today (it’s also today’s poll), specifically if I thought it discriminated against women.

I said first that there are devices that would allow women to use a urinal but really it is the fratboy/lager lout crowd that is primarily responsible for the unacceptable behaviour downtown. I was also asked whether this was catering to law-breakers (Murray Langdon’s editorial) but I pointed out that in daytime there are many washroom opportunities but practically nothing at night, so it’s a needed service.

Phillipe Lucas appeared via phone and he thought public toilets should take into account the disabled and parents with babies (but that adds another level of complication in my mind). I don’t think you need any special apparatus to change a baby in public and I seriously doubt any parent would take a baby into a urinal even if it came equipped with a change table.

Globe discussion on SALOME project

Globe & Mail follow-up to yesterday`s story on giving heroin to addicts.

The Globe on Vancouver’s new heroin for addicts plan

Trial to give free heroin to hard-core addicts in Vancouver and Montreal

It’s known as the SALOME trial, and it follows on the heels of the NAOMI study.

The NAOMI trial was criticized by some addictions physicians but drew no comment from the federal government, which paid more than $8-million for the research.

“It’s been disappointing,” said Martin Schechter, who led NAOMI and is also working on SALOME. Dr. Schechter said European health authorities are very interested in the work, but Canadian authorities will not acknowledge it.

“There’s a lot invested in NAOMI. We did everything we could to translate the information for decision-makers to make them understand what it meant,” he said.

Dr. Krausz, a leading addictions researcher, has conducted another heroin trial in Germany, the largest such randomized clinical trial in Europe.

The Canadian research aims to determine if medically prescribed heroin is a safe and effective treatment and if users will accept the drug in pill form instead of injecting it.. It will also measure whether a licenced narcotic, Hydromorphone, can be used instead of heroin.

His team is now recruiting about 200 severe heroin addicts who have failed to respond to existing treatments and they expect to have the clinics in Vancouver and Montreal open by this fall.

Last week, Dr. Krausz’s medical team sat down with Vancouver philanthropists asking for additional support for the clinics that will distribute both heroin and a legal narcotic substitute to hard-core addicts. Organizers say one business leader immediately offered a cheque for $100,000.

Can this work? Only if detox and effective addictions treatment are close behind, just as it should be with a needle exchange or supervised injection site. I fear too many carrots and not enough sticks are being offered. All the programs targeted for addicts must have as their end goal the elimination or reduction of the drug use that shatters the body, brain and spirit.

Rob on C-FAX

Thursday, April 9 from 12:30 to 1 p.m., I’ll be a panelist on the Ryan Price show on C-FAX 1070 AM talking about random Downtown things. Click the link to listen live.