‘They have better priorities’: advocate criticizes VPD over opioid replacement pot seizure

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – A group that’s been on the front lines of the opioid crisis says actions by Vancouver Police officers on Friday only harms people battling addition.

“We obviously have our overdose prevention site where we watch people while they’re using drugs to make sure they don’t overdose and die,” explains Sarah Blyth, executive director of the Vancouver Overdose Prevention Society. “But OPS also has another harm-reduction program, through which people are offered alternatives to opiates to people dealing with pain.”

That program is called High Hopes, and Blyth says it provides people with marijuana — a safe alternative to opioids to manage addiction and pain.

On Friday morning, some of these products were taken by Vancouver Police officers.

Just after 10:00 a.m., the VPD says officers were in the market at 62 East Hastings Street and found a table with “a plastic display of mainly cannabis products, marked for sale.”

In a statement, police say they seized the products after no one took ownership.

But Blyth says police know about this program, and have for at least the past year. She says officers, especially those that patrol that area, are “very familiar” with the High Hopes program.

“Because they are there every single day, and they’ve been there for over a year,” she adds.”They know that the program exists, all levels of officers know that it exists. So for them to say that is disingenuous, and they do understand the program.”

She believes police have bigger priorities, and calls the whole ordeal “disappointing”, and “mean.”

“It’s not helping people, it’s not keeping people safe,” she adds. “In fact, I beg to differ. Giving people safe alternatives keeps people from the pain they’re in.”

The VPD says the cannabis — which is still an illegal substance — was sitting in plain view at the market.

“Although our officers tried to identify the owner of the cannabis products being openly sold, no one took responsibility for it,” the statement reads. “This removed the opportunity for our officers to collect enough information from which they could base their next course of action.”

“We have seen this type of trafficking of cannabis in other parts of Vancouver and have taken enforcement action after informal attempts to resolve the issue(s) were not successful,” the VPD adds. “Selling cannabis in this manner is illegal now and will continue to be illegal after cannabis is decriminalized in October.”

Blyth claims there’s a lot of support for the program, and says the VPD may have seized the marijuana products at the market on Friday, but adds it was set back up an hour later.

“When we started our overdose prevention site, people support this. People support saving lives — this is one way that we’re doing it. We would like to have more opiate alternatives for people. It’s crazy to criminalize drug users this way.”

She says her group isn’t going anywhere, and that police are going to have to figure out how to get used to their work, especially amid a deadly overdose crisis.

Blyth would like to work with all levels of government to fight the epidemic, and says police need to be involved.

“We want police that are helpful in this crisis,” she tells NEWS 1130. “We would love to work with police that are informed and helpful.”

The legalization of recreational marijuana is set for Oct. 17th.

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