Not a fan of Fox, but there are stats in this article that are worth noting and I didn’t see them in the others.

Copy/pasta if you don’t want to give them the click, bolding is mine:

PORTLAND Ore. (KPTV) - The Portland City Council passed an open-use drug ban Wednesday with a unanimous vote.

The ordinance won’t alter BM 110, which was passed by voters in 2020 and decriminalizes the possession of hard drugs and will go into effect as soon as it’s authorized by the Oregon Legislature or a court approves the ban.

While there’s already an ordinance to ban drinking alcohol in public, the new ordinance would add controlled substances. Those who violate the ordinance could face a fine up to $500 or spend six months in jail.

During public testimony, local business leaders from across Portland expressed their frustrations in how drug use has affected them.

Jeff Miller, CEO of Travel Portland, says in 2019 hotel occupancy was 85-90% in the summer. Now four years later, occupancy is at 63%. Miller says he believes the decrease in hospitality is linked to drug dealing and usage.

“Most cities rebook 70% of those conventions in Portland. We’ve rebooked 30%. They said we’re not coming back. Portland is too dangerous,” says Miller. “If leisure in business travel do not come back you as a city, and we as an organization will see those revenues dropped dramatically.”

David Friedericks of Portland Fire & Rescue Station 1 says his station alone responded to a total of 76 overdose calls over Labor Day weekend and calls the high volume of calls is disheartening.

“In some cases we treat the same patient in the same week. And we know through our partners of AMR, that the same patient has overdosed multiple times in a day,” says Friedericks. “I know that even when we try to help, our help is unwanted, wares on all of us.”

Tony Vezina of 4D Recovery Services says he doesn’t think the ban will be efficient.

“It may just kind of hide addicts. I was an addict; I was on the street before I had to hide,” says Vezina. “It may create a limited intervention that is only applied to people we can see in downtown Portland smoking in front of businesses using fatal or high addictive drugs.”

Vezina believes there needs to be a sensible intervention and bring in additional resources to prevent people from getting addicted provide treatment are and provide long-term recovery support.

    • tsonfeir@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      Pointless. No mental health? Lol. This is just a clinic and no one will do anything with the money besides pocket it.

      Got an address. Of one? A date? Nah

      • Rowsdower@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        1 year ago

        https://bridgestochange.com/ 7916 SE Foster Rd, Portland, OR 97206

        https://www.lifeworksnw.org/ (multiple physical locations) 3716 NE Martin Luther King Jr Blvd, Portland, OR 97212 | 5240 NE Elam Young Pkwy, Hillsboro, OR 97124 | 8425 N Lombard St, Portland, OR 97203 | etc

        https://www.mhaoforegon.org/ 411 NE 19th Avenue, Portland, Oregon 97232

        Between quarters 1, and 2 the number of people engaged in peer support services nearly doubled. Going from 4.7k people to 9.1k

        • tsonfeir@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          Which one of these would be the one who gets the homeless people downstairs off the street and off of drugs? Every night one of them is pacing the block, screaming at the top of their lungs as they argue with themselves for hours. I need sleep.

          • homeless
          • drug addict (probably)
          • mentally Ill

          Feel bad for them…. But I’m not going to suffer with them.

          • Rowsdower@lemmy.ca
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            off the street

            Housing Services

            off of drugs

            Peer Support Services, SUD Tx (Low Barrier Substance Use Disorder Treatment)

            • tsonfeir@lemm.ee
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              What’s the phone number I can call where a person will come get them, get them off drugs and off the street and rehabilitate them? And what if they say “go away?”

              We aren’t able to force “help” on people who don’t want help. So now what?