San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie is rolling out a new approach to one of the city’s oldest problems.
The goal is to better tackle open air drug use in the city, and the mayor’s new solution involves both arrests and treatment.
“Let me say we as a city were caught flat footed by the fentanyl crisis, since January we are tackling this in new and innovative ways,” Lurie said.
It began with neighborhood outreach teams, then added treatment and recovery beds and now a sobering center.
“This center is going to allow us a new tool and that is because previously it was either jail or the emergency room now you continue to use openly on our streets we are going to arrest you and you’re going to have an option of treatment or jail and so that is what this center is all about,” Lurie said.
The center will be set up South of Market on 6th Street and run by a contractor overseen by the sheriff’s office.
It will be a place where officers bring people arrested for public drug use to get sober and be connected to treatment.
The mayor says it will also allow officers to get back on the streets quicker, because they won’t have to wait through the traditional jail booking process.
Lurie says it’s the latest tool in the all-out effort to clean up city streets.
People brought to the center would not be charged with a crime, but would need to stay at the facility until considered sober, which could take hours.
Those who try to leave before that could go to jail.
“I think success is always based on fewer drug users on the sidewalks,” said Randy Shaw with the Tenderloin Housing Clinic.
“I appreciate the innovation in ensuring and that were not actually sending people to jail we’re sending them to a sobering center so they have the resources and the care and the services that to get better,” said Supervisor Bilal Mahmood.
Mahmood was asked about the idea for the center, including what some are calling “the coercive element.”
“I have my own perspective on the coercive element, I think my focus is that we should be providing as many services as possible. There has to be somewhere for people to go I personally have concerns about some of those components but I appreciate the innovation in insuring that there are now places for people to go,” Mahmood said.
Source: NBC Bay Area
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