By Jessie Weisner

Council has multiple unanswered questions about supervised consumption site

Mar 5, 2019 | 4:10 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB — Opioids and safe consumption sites have been the hot topic at Medicine Hat City Council meetings for the last few months, and Monday nights meeting was no exception.

From policing to possible funding to working with other cities, council still has many questions about the site.

Mayor Ted Clugston says it’s been difficult to get any answers from the province.

“What’s happened here in Medicine Hat is disgraceful, I still haven’t seen my MLA yet,” says Clugston.

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On Monday, council voted to support a grant to fund better communication between nine Alberta cities on the opioid crisis. 

Grande Prairie is taking the lead in applying for the grant, saying the opioid health issue is straining civic resources, and as each community tackles the problem, new knowledge needs to be shared.

The grant funds will be used to co-ordinate information sharing between the cities of Medicine Hat, Edmonton, Lethbridge, Calgary, Airdrie, Red Deer, Grande Prairie, Leduc and the Municipality of Wood Buffalo.

“Every community is struggling with ‘what do we do as a municipality with the increased costs with policing or security or what if property values go down or who’s gonna pay for that,” says Clugston. “So it’s just we’re not getting any answers from the other two levels of government.”

Council is currently searching for answers to those questions, in addition to researching ways to keep the public safe when the supervised consumption site at 502 South Railway Street Southeast opens.

On February 4, Councillor Julie Friesen put forward a motion, which was approved by a unanimous vote.

The motion read:

“In view of the public safety and business concerns observed in our and other communities in Southern Alberta arising from the advent of supervised consumption sites, let the CAO be directed to investigate all options available to the City of Medicine Hat to deal with these public safety and business concerns.”

During the past month the city’s Chief Administrative Officer Bob Nicolay has been consulting with the public, surrounding businesses, legal counsel and HIV Community Link.

In the last two weeks, Medicine Hat Police and members of the Police Commission were also met with.
Clugston says the contact was mainly to collect baseline data on crime in the area. Increasing police presence around the site has been mentioned, but Clugston says that’s not city councils decision.

“We have to recognize that there is a wall beyond council and we can’t direct the police what to do,” says Clugston.

Increased policing has been implemented in other communities with supervised consumption sites, like Calgary, who added 11 officers near their Sheldon Chumir site.

“So that really is a decision of the commission and the chief,” says Clugston. “If they ask for funding this council will have to make some difficult choices as to whether we should be paying for those extra operational costs or the province should be paying for it.”

Although Clugston is aware the city may need to pay costs associated with the site, he’s adamant the price tag should be on the provinces shoulders.

“It’s their initiative so I think they probably should pay for it,” he said.

Police say they won’t comment further on the topic, until the site is opened. 

Renovations have begun on the location set to be the supervised consumption site, but no opening date has been announced.