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To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

nytimes.com

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Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#921

Post by duped »

joenot443 wrote: post #885
duped wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a measure for how this compares to places without social programs for drug addicts? This is a legitimate question, I don't know if they've done better or worse in the context of the failed war on drugs. Because the country as a whole has been completely ravaged by opiate addiction. It's not just Portland and Seattle. West Virginia doesn't have anything like this, and it's just as badly afflicted. It may be l…

I presently live in New York but I lived in Seattle in 2020. Open air drug use and homelessness in general is unquestionably a bigger problem in Seattle, despite NYC lacking some of the more progressive policies west coast cities have become so famous for. Anyone who's lived in both the east and west coast can attest to the difference, it's so stark that I find it funny people are still asking if broad coastal politi…

My question isn't about how visible drug addiction is but any actual metrics that can compare actual drug addiction rates and prevalence between places with decriminalization and those without.

Because just some cursory googling suggests that these cities do have less incidence of drug addiction/use per capita. But I don't really know how accurate that info is, and anecdata doesn't count.

Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#922

Post by paulddraper »

bitcharmer wrote: post #758
swalling wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Portland did everything! They invested huge sums in shelters, treatment programs, counsellors, etc." This is not even remotely true. Everyone in the city, from the mayor [1] to the head of the largest services non-profit [2] has been yelling from the rooftops about the glacial slowness to effectively spend the allocated funding for drug treatment. Until just months ago, Multnomah County has been sitting on tens of m…

Appreciate your comment. Terrifyingly high number of commenters (likely Americans) drawing flawed conclusions. We tried and failed, therefore this problem is unsolvable. Dozens of cities in other parts of the world had much success, so maybe you're doing it wrong? Zurich did a great job, especially with the transformation of the infamous needle park.

Be cautious about applying lessons across significantly different culture.

Just because democracy took off in America doesn't mean it will take off in Iraq.

Just because drug legalization worked in Zurich doesn't mean it will work in Portland.

Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#923

Post by paulddraper »

onetimeuse92304 wrote: post #807
dougmwne wrote: post #795

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ll add another inconvenient truth that I’ve realized. You can copy every law and policy that’s working so well in some other (Scandinavian) place and have it still fail horribly. That’s because it was never the laws that were working, but the society and culture as a whole. You can’t bring good laws to a place with a disintegrating social fabric and expect the same results.

Yes. Exactly same way that trying to transplant ideas like agile or microservices or testing driven development fails so miserably most of the time. It is not that the ideas are wrong. It is that they are not the correct moves for a team that is not ready for them. I know it sounds like a silly parallel. But changing societies is hard, long, unique and not well understood process. It makes sense to try to learn from…

But if we spend enough money, we can successful transplant peaceful democracy to Afghanistan, right?

Maybe like $2 trillion over a decade?

Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#924

Post by paulddraper »

cultureswitch wrote: post #854
thwarted wrote: post #680

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is more to life than paying taxes Exactly. You don't pay taxes to pay taxes, you pay taxes for the collective benefits you get out of it. Paying taxes and not getting the benefits of safe cities, clean roads, parks, and all the other things that government does, then you are living life only to pay taxes.

Actually, I pay taxes because I have to.

Same reason as death.

Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#925

Post by arandomsapien »

mikhael wrote: post #429
arandomsapien wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm severely visually impaired. I walk and use public transit. Currently in the pacific northwest. My quality of life has decreased so much since covid and when these policies came into effect. I tripped over someone asleep on the train floor and they lost their shit. I was really scared. One of dozens of instances. And the cities in general must become less walkable to avoid crime. Fences around apartments that mean…

hopefully this doesn’t sound insulting - have you considered cities outside of the US, like Tokyo or others in Japan?

I know a bit about Tokyo and while I love the idea, I don't think it's very practical. The language barrier is real. I'm not great at non-computer languages, and Japanese script seems tough to read when one is visually impaired. From what I've seen, living as a foreigner there can be a bit isolating long term.

Currently looking at Europe. But immigration is hard anywhere. And there are tax implications I don't understand well.

Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#926

Post by scionthefly »

legitster wrote: post #57

Drug legalization is something I have come 180 on (or at least, 90 degrees). Portland did everything! They invested huge sums in shelters, treatment programs, counsellors, etc. ODs have more than doubled, and the shelters are half empty! They are not one more social program away from cleaning out the streets. I think the experiment has radically failed and I'm ready to say I was wrong. While I don't want to go back t…

Does this analysis also consider the wide ranging massive impact of fentanyl and similar drugs that have skyrocketed drug overdose problems in all communities in the past five years?

Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#927

Post by gamblor956 »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #669
gamblor956 wrote: post #483

As someone who used to represent drug addicts in a past career... Drugs are illegal for a reason. Making drugs legal just makes the problem worse; the reasons most drugs are illegal is because of the many negative side effects they impose on users...and others. Voluntary rehab and counseling don't work. Permissive policies don't work. There are literally thousands of shelters beds empty each night in LA, SF, and Port…

Imo the US (and most countries) really fucked up putting Marijuana down in the same tier as hard drugs. I feel a lot of people think since Marijuana isn't that bad, neither are the others. Which leads to the number of people voting for these 'decriminalize all drugs' policies. Doesn't help when you see people comparing Heroin to alcohol or nicotine as well...

Marijuana, like all psychoactive drugs, is known to trigger latent mental disorders, which is the primary reason it was made a controlled drug in the first place. It is also known to cause infertility in men and women due to the interaction between THC and various hormones.

It also has a number of other negative health effects (e.g., lung cancer, popcorn lung, asthma, etc.) if smoked as weed or vaped which are generally avoided if marijuana is consumed as an edible or liquid.

Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#928

Post by stcroixx »

recursive wrote: post #319
plandis wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really doubt homeless people are good pet owners. Food scarcity, lack of medical care for your pets, etc, etc…

What does that have to do with anything? Being a bad pet owner doesn't make you a non-pet-owner.

Not always, but it certainly can. Many animal control departments consider leaving a dog outside 24/7 to be neglect/cruelty and will take that dog from you.

Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#929

Post by mannyv »

legitster wrote: post #57

Drug legalization is something I have come 180 on (or at least, 90 degrees). Portland did everything! They invested huge sums in shelters, treatment programs, counsellors, etc. ODs have more than doubled, and the shelters are half empty! They are not one more social program away from cleaning out the streets. I think the experiment has radically failed and I'm ready to say I was wrong. While I don't want to go back t…

Realistically speaking, homeless drug users don't want treatment or shelter; they want to be left alone to do drugs.

Most drug users don't want to get off drugs. That's why you need an intervention. No addict likes interventions either. You have to be really self disciplined to turn yourself into treatment.

Re: To revive Portland, officials seek to ban public drug use

#930

Post by [deleted] »

stjohnswarts wrote: post #884
swalling wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, actually we should be trying to fix the stupid mistakes that were made in implementation of the plan, not roll it back and keep on fighting an equally moronic, ineffective, and racist War on Drugs elsewhere. The best available evidence is that decriminalization essentially had no effect on overdose deaths ( https://www.opb.org/article/2023/10/03/ballot-measure-110-di... ). It was going to go up no matter what bec…

I don't think lack of tech bros manning high cost corporate square footage is what is causing the homeless, crime, and addiction problems in West Coast cities. It seems more like bad policies to me. The time window to blame everything on covid is passing quickly

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