A local non-profit organization provided Nanaimo city council with a look into how they have spent approximately $300,000 which was provided to enhance services for those in need, not only within the city but around the province.
Connective Nanaimo has been supporting people who are looking for help when it comes to housing, education, employment, community outreach, justice services, and many others across the province.
Executive director John Horn says he is grateful for all the support council, and the city, have shown for the program as it is so critical to help anyone who needs it.
“We are seeing an increase in those people who have been radically affected by substance abuse,” Horn says. “These patterns have changed, and so have the nature of the drugs and this has given rise to different behavior.
“This has increasingly come in conflict with local communities, and citizens. It is not the people have changed, the drugs and distribution models have changed.”
Horn says everything has changed so much since the pandemic and it has played a significant factor in communities across BC, and it is having different impacts right across the province.
“The type of drugs is very toxic, and the behaviors that go with them are extreme which causes stress for everyone in communities all over BC,” he says. “The impact is in the people who have been impacted by substance abuse.”
Horn says he is aware of how important it is to address public safety and deal with a rising crisis in Nanaimo, and across the province, and with help from council they have been able to start implementing a plan to address this.
“We need to provide opportunities for people with no money, or those who need to reintegrate into society and provide them with a full four-month supportive recovery program,” Horn says. “It is expensive for rehab, sometimes up to $60,0000 per person.
“This is why we see people on the street, it is because people who can’t afford and don’t have access to get the support they need.”
While Horn admits more needs to be done with supportive recovery, he also says part of providing a stable program is housing those in recovery can be in.
“What we see is people without housing are much more erratic in their behavior than people who have stable housing,” he says. “We not only offer sobriety as a way out of that world, but we want to minimize impacts on the community by helping provide housing.”
Horn says his Connective is in place to help anyone who needs it but feels with the growing drug crisis the provincial government needs to change their policies drastically to combat it.
“I see while there is a commitment from the government but there is still an inability to wrestle with fundamental social issues,” he says. “They don’t know how and even the rest of us are struggling to figure out how.
“We are not fixing the problem compared to the rate it is growing. We are going must take quantum leaps in understanding how to fix the crisis.”
Connective provides services in the Lower Mainland, Fraser Valley, Interior Okanagan, Northern BC, Vancouver Island, and the Yukon.
