Nansi Long says the time is now for the city to consider setting up a 24-hour safe drug consumption site.
It's not the answer to get people off drugs, but she says it will give drug users an alternative to loitering in the entranceways of downtown businesses when they are injecting and smoking their drugs.
"I know a 24-hour safe consumption site is a really unpopular idea because people think if you have a place where people can do drugs, they're going to do more drugs," said Long, the activity centre co-ordinator for the Prince George branch of the B.C. Schizophrenia Society.
"That's not the case. It's going to get them out of the doorways. People are saying, 'They're doing it in front of my business, I'm afraid to show it to my children.' They are using in our doorways because they are lighted."
Long is convinced a 24-hour site would reduce the risk of overdoses and would also reduce the number of needles drug users discard on city streets.
"They need a place where they can go to get their drugs tested, so they can be assured their supply is safe," said Long. "They can connect with people who may have something to offer them. What it is mostly is about disconnection, they're disconnected from us as a community, they've disconnected from their families, we have so many people that are hurting but we do have the solution within our community."
Long chairs the Prince George Mental Health and Addictions Advisory Committee and is part of the Prince George Community Action Team. A scheduling conflict kept her from participating in the team's work detail on Dec. 2, where volunteers walked the streets of downtown armed with gloves, garbage bags and containers for drug needles.
"Mental health and trauma are most often at the root of addiction," Long said. These are people who, because of what has happened in their life, have inappropriate survival skills and we just need to come together as a community to make that better."
Long was among more than 30 presenters who spoke to city council at the Dec. 2 public meeting at City Hall to try to find solutions to the problems connected to street people in the downtown core.
"We don't have to endlessly meet and talk about these things, we just need to get doing," said Long.
"When we talk about housing, we don't need big housing projects, we need small housing projects. We need neighbourhoods and we need people to become a community again and stop thinking that it's us versus them. It's not. How we heal people is we include them."
She said the city should consider increasing its budget to allow for more for policing. She's called the RCMP to her downtown office to deal with unruly people and the wait times for help to arrive have been frightening to her and her staff.
She blames the justice system for failing to deal with perpetrators of crime in ways that make them bear responsibility for what they've done and make restitution to their victims.
"The police can only do so much," said Long. "They go through the justice system and they're back out in two hours. There's no responsibility on them because we're not asking to undo the harm that they've done. There are no consequences.
"When we punish people for having mental health (issues) by throwing them in jail and giving them no supports while they're in jail, how does that help them? All that teaches them is better skills to help them survive in the element that's not OK for them."
