Consider the words of that famous businessman Jacob Marley “Mankind was my business”. In choosing to pursue the premiership of British Columbia you made the health and welfare of these citizens “your business” and your “business” is failing badly due to your neglect, fear and unwillingness to provide needed leadership. These issues may not be pleasant, easy to address, popular or without great challenge.

True leadership is about making the tough choices. The story below from www.homelessinabbotsford.com calls for true leadership. It is time for you to Decide.

“Why is it so god-damned hard? Why is it so unfair?” I could hear the pain and fatigue in her voice as she asked the question, her eyes revealing her soul deep weariness of spirit.

She was not speaking of life but of detoxification from drugs. For the first time in the years I have known her, she desperately wants to get clean. If there were a detox bed available she would now be started on the path to a life free from drugs and off the streets.

But there are no beds, no room for someone seeking help. It will take up to three weeks of phoning every day, struggling to keep clean and free of drugs, trying not to use drugs to ease the pain of the wait. Homeless – but having to find a phone to call every day; Homeless – but having to try to keep from surrendering to hopelessness; Homeless – crying for help, those cries falling on deaf ears.

We know that the best chance for her those who find themselves seeking to reclaim their lives is to get a bed immediately. We have witnessed how many we lose of those who face the wait for a detox bed back to drugs and the street.

If a person is lucky in their timing there is a bed available to them immediately. The unlucky majority rolls snake-eyes and face detoxing on the street surrounded by the drugs that will relieve their pain. Many people get a little headache and they quickly take the drug aspirin for pain relief. Do you honestly think that YOU, facing the pain of detoxing alone and on the streets, would not seek the “pain relief drugs” you needed?

Maple Ridge, Chilliwack. Cordova and Vancouver – four detoxification centers for the entire lower mainland. There is a drug use epidemic on our streets and we have only these four inadequate facilities for those trying to find help. If this was not enough of a barrier bureaucracy steps forward to add another in the form of “health” regions. With two centers in the Coastal region and two in the Fraser region you cannot be on all four waiting lists in order to get the first bed but are restricted to your health region. Which raises the question of whether the reason we are not now opening another detox is that the two regions are to busy fighting over which region gets funding for such a facility to remember they are suppose to about Health?

I do know that a serious commitment to getting clean should not depend on, nor so often be defeated by, so literally a roll of the dice.

So the next time you see someone suffering the scourge of addiction instead of looking down your nose or assuming a “holier than thou” attitude it would be a more truthful reflection of reality if you apologized for the lack of detoxification, rehabilitation and the community based support programs we know will reclaim lives from addiction.