BC NDP are weaponizing drug law to cover their healthcare and housing failures: Nurses & healthcare staff
Eleven staff in BC’s healthcare system outline the realities of frontline care work, the toxic drug crisis and their concerns.
Latest
Weaponizing safety in the new Alberta
I was arrested at the University of Calgary anti-genocide protest on May 9 after standing with the students assaulted by Calgary Police. The move reflected an old but expanding reality in Alberta, where threats to the safety of the state dictate police violence. One week ago, I was sitting in
Alberta's system for involuntary addiction treatment just hired its manager
A revealing LinkedIn announcement by the newly hired Manager of Compassionate Intervention Implementation confirms the government's intention to force people who use drugs into addiction treatment. Robert Murdoch, former Senior Policy Analyst in Alberta's Ministry of Mental Health and Addiction, announced via LinkedIn on May 6
'A unique export': Is Alberta recreating the abusive Troubled Teen Industry?
American journalists, researchers and survivors of abuse in youth residential addiction treatment centres describe blood-curdling stories of widespread sexual and physical abuse that hint at a potential outcome of the treatment infrastructure under construction in Alberta.
Newsletter
Police helicopters are overused and dangerous: cases in point
A man is dead after being chased by the Edmonton Police Air-1 helicopter onto dangerous ice of the North Saskatchewan River. In July 2022, a similarly over-the-top deployment was caught on film in Calgary's Sunalta neighbourhood. Just two weeks after being directed to investigate, the Alberta Serious Incident
Think like a recovery capitalist: involuntary abstinence in the Emerald City
How a group of fundamentalists is constructing a great wooden horse standing tall on carcerality, profiteering and propaganda to deliver Compassion unto the people. The Emerald City is, on the surface, a beautiful place built from bounties buried deep in the Earth's crust, where most everyone believes in
Think like a recovery capitalist: Business basics
If exploitation is the driving force of drug prohibition, privatized 'treatment' is the paved road it rolls on. So, in the spirit of knowing your enemy, a look at the business challenges faced by these organizations. This two-part series is adapted from a presentation delivered at Community Conversations:
Are news media finally fed up with UCP drug war propaganda?
The Alberta government is scrambling to glue together its narrative that overdose deaths can be solved through a limited scope of privatized rehab. But a live interview on CBC Calgary pulled the curtain on the strategy's naked truth. CBC Calgary's Rob Brown came prepared to his
Recovery Capitalists 3: Controlling the conversation
Recovery Capital Conference has informed world-renowned recovery and harm reduction advocate Guy Felicella that he is not welcome at this year's conference. The move fits the Alberta government's pattern of controlling public drug policy discourse and stifling dissent against its abstinence-only strategy. See also: Part 1
Recovery Capitalists 2: Spreading public wealth
Over a year after inking the deal, the Alberta Ministry of Mental Health and Addiction has yet to disclose the recipient of its largest contract. The recipient appears to be ROSC Solutions Group, whose owner and top staff are connected to the Premier's chief of staff and were
Recovery Capitalists 1: Mobilizing policy through allies
The upcoming Recovery Capital Conference in Calgary serves three main functions: mobilizing Alberta government policy through credible actors, repaying these actors with public funding, and recruiting for the far-right. Part 1 examines the first of these, and what happens when credibility falls short. See also: Part 2 and Part 3.
Part 3 - How Calgary Police leadership cheated the census
Calgary Police Chief Mark Neufeld spun the 2022 CPS workplace census as evidence that CPS reflects the community. But the census data tell the opposite story, revealing an impassable canyon between the demographics of Calgary Police and the city that pays their salaries. An oft-repeated principle of policing is "