Dollars and deliberation on road to harm reduction

published on April 12, 2024 by Katrina Clarke in Winnipeg Free Press

The people at Prairie Harm Reduction anticipated pushback before their organization opened Saskatchewan’s first and only supervised consumption site in 2020.

So they headed it off. They got police, fire and the City of Saskatoon on board, they knocked on every door in the surrounding neighbourhood and then they opened the doors for public tours.

The facility and others like it in B.C., Alberta, Ontario and Quebec, provide safe, clean spaces for people to use their own illegal substances in the presence of trained staff, preventing accidental overdoses and reducing the spread of infectious diseases.

“We had lots of people coming in ready to fight,” says Kayla DeMong, Prairie Harm Reduction’s executive director. “By the time they left, they were handing us cheques.

“Once they really got to see what it was and what was going to be happening, they became a lot more supportive.”

Manitoba is now at a similar turning point…