The operator of the Integrity Recovery Society residential substance treatment centre in a suburban College Heights house was denied a three-year temporary use permit to operate the facility at Monday’s city council meeting.
Rick Edwards said he was “blindsided” by council’s decision to not allow him an extension to continue to treat clients who are required to remain completely abstinent from all drug and alcohol use as a condition of entry in the six-bed halfway house at 7973 Rochester Cres.
Council voted 7-2 in support of administration’s recommendation that the application be turned down because the neighbourhood is designated RS2 Single Housing and is not zoned for supportive housing.
“I didn’t see it coming, I was blindsided by it,” said Edwards, who sat through the meeting with three of Integrity’s residential recovery clients. “It’s frustrating because the information I heard them all share was really not true and not what my application was about.
“My application was about rezoning. I’m confused about the whole process. This is information that should have been provided to me a long time ago. This application is 13 months old. We just wanted the rezoning so we’d be governed under the assisted living registry who kinds of governs societies like us."
Deanna Wasnik, the city’s director of planning and development, in her recommendations to council, said the application for supportive housing is not consistent with the city’s Official Community Plan and is not compatible with the surrounding land uses.
“At this time there are only a handful of sites that are specifically zones for supportive housing, which are included in multi-family zones or a comprehensive zone, not on sites zoned single-family residential, as the subject property is,” said Wasnik.
Council received four letters of support from some of Integrity’s neighbours on Rochester Crescent, but there were also 34 letters that did not support having a residential treatment centre there. Edwards said he was glad there were only 34.
“It’s that same old thing, not in my back yard,” he said.
He said if more people in his neighbourhood knew the real story about what goes on in that Rochester house, they would support what he’s trying to do to help people, many of whom are just coming out of jail, get back on their feet again.
“They’re not familiar with what real recovery is,” Edwards said. “I’m not talking the downtown recovery where you see them zipping along on 10-speeds with backpacks full of contraband items.
“Our individuals that are with us that are cleaning up are jumping in their vehicle, packing a lunchbox and working all day, then are coming home. Once they’re at home, they’re looking after house duties, then they’re going to (Narcotics Anonymous or Alcoholics Anonymous) meetings, they’re putting in time to better their lives and they have to follow certain structures and routines.”
Several councillors spoke of the need for the substance treatment services Integrity provides and the shortage of treatment beds in the city but could not look beyond the procedural guidelines that would have been broken had they acted against administration’s advice that they deny the application.
Wasnik said rezoning would be a five-to-six-month process that would require changes to the OCP and a public hearing. Some council members suggested Integrity could continue to operate if it comes into compliance with the Community Care and Assisted Living Act that provides licensing for community care facilities.
But because of Integrity’s abstinence-first requirement, Edwards says that’s not possible for his group. They are not eligible for provincial funding because they do not allow clients to use hard drugs on-site.
“Complete abstinence programs are here to actually complement the harm reduction programs because harm reduction is not a program for life,” said Edwards, a former heroin addict. “Harm reduction is a program you start, to get off the drugs, with the end game of getting to complete abstinence. Now that they’re wanting to shut down the Integrity Recovery Society, there will be no complete abstinence programs in northern British Columbia.
“Everyone is so ‘harm-reduction this’ and ‘let’s give them drugs so they can stop using drugs.’ That’s ludicrous. It’s proven it doesn’t work. What does work is compete abstinence programs and you’re going to find out the community is really starting to understand that is the route we need to go. There needs to be more services for it and they need to be supported a lot more. Harm reduction has created a lot of jobs and it’s making a living off the addict’s back.”
Edwards was a former client turned executive director at Chilliwack’s VisionQuest Recovery Centre before he moved to Prince George four years ago to start Integrity Recovery Society. He applied for the three-year temporary use permit in August 2023 at a cost of $2,000, paid for by the Drug Awareness Recovery Team, which employs many of Integrity’s clients as gardeners and labourers.
Coun. Trudy Klassen and Coun. Tim Bennett cast the dissenting votes Monday.
Klassen said Edwards deserves to keep the Rochester treatment centre operating because it offers an alternative to other supportive housing facilities in the province whose provincial funding hinges on them accepting clients who use prescribed safer supply harm reduction drugs as an alternative to illicit opioids. She said Edwards should have highlighted the abstinence aspect of his clients in his application and that might have swayed more council votes the other way.
“Not everybody knows how to fight city hall,” said Klassen. “It’s a worthwhile thing and there might have been issues with it, but surely they could have been ironed out. Not everybody can manage harm reduction in other ways. Abstinence-based programs work for some people and if someone is willing to do that hard work we have to be willing to support it. Why does a facility that is abstinence-based not get provincial funding, that is ideological and wrong and cruel.”
Bennett said while having a treatment centre in an established residential area away from the trappings of the downtown core where illicit drugs are more readily available and more visible would be beneficial to clients, public consultation remains a necessary element for the operator. Bennett said in the meeting he would deny the three-year permit but ultimately voted in Integrity’s favour.
Mayor Simon Yu said there was no way he could approve Edwards’s application knowing he had already been operating in the city for four years and wanted another three-year extension. That would have exceeded past practice for the city to renew a three-year permit only once, so it will not exceed a six-year temporary use limit.
“They are not registered as a society and then they have been operating that way for four years and they requested three years, so therefore if we voted in favour we would have been shooting our own bylaw down,” said Yu. “ We can’t be put in a position to violate our own procedures. The process is still there for a rezoning application. We’re not going to say,’ hey you’ve got to move out’ or what’s the point of rezoning. They still have at least half a year to get the thing recognized.”
Yu said several letter-writers who are opposed mentioned police had been called to the house to investigate noise complaints. Bylaw services received one complaint, filed in April, over allegations of harassment and inappropriate remarks/gestures from residents of the house, concern tenants were not receiving adequate supervision or support, that there were than six residents in care on the property and that it is operating without a business licence.
Wasnik and Eric Depenau, director of administrative services, said they would not be pressuring Edwards to immediately close down the Rochester house while he determines whether to pursue the rezoning process.
Yu said a change in government in the Oct. 19 provincial election might be enough to bring Integrity in line for provincial funding. That would be good news for Edwards, who says he’s spent $100,000 of his own money keeping the program operating in Prince George. He said he’s already had to close one of his residential treatment centres on Lemoyne Drive in Lower College Heights because of the operating costs.
