B.C.’s health minister says she will push ahead with proposed overdose prevention site in Vancouver

Vancouver’s mayor said Tuesday that he would “use all tools available’ to prevent the opening of a new overdose prevention site (OPS) downtown at 900 Helmcken, but B.C. Health Minister Josie Osborne is pushing back.

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Make no mistake, Osborne says: while the city puts forward motions to block the site, the province has the authority to go ahead with it anyway.

“There’s a ministerial order that was signed by the Minister of Health back in 2016 that provides the direction to health authorities to ensure that these life-saving services are available for people, and that’s exactly what we’re going to do,” she told 1130 NewsRadio.

Osborne says the government wants to partner with the City of Vancouver and other municipalities across B.C. when it comes to providing services and helping people connect to the care they need.

“We want to be willing partners working together and making it the best service possible.”

She says Vancouver City Council’s complaint that the city needs more treatment facilities than overdose prevention sites is off-base.

“We have to keep people alive in order to be able to connect them to care,” she said.

“That’s what overdose prevention services do. They are just one part of a continuum of harm-reduction services, of treatment and recovery services that are available to people in Vancouver.”

On Wednesday, Mayor Ken Sim posted a letter on social media that he had sent to Osborne two days prior.

In it, Sim writes that the first formal notice the city received about the OPS was in an April 23 letter from Vancouver Coastal Health saying that a lease had already been secured and operations were set to begin shortly after June 1.

“By that point, the decision was effectively made,” Kim said.

“Neither the city, residents, or local stakeholders were adequately engaged in advance.”

In the letter, he requests that Osborne provide details about how the location was chosen, a full list of alternative sites that were considered, and confirmation of any consultation undertaken.

Sim is also pushing for a public meeting so locals and stakeholders can ask questions and get some clarity about the proposed OPS.

— With files from Dean Recksiedler