ACCKWA signs open letter to province asking for more funding as Cambridge CTS put on hold

Cambridge's Consumption and Treatment Site (CTS) application is on hold andthe organization set to operate it has joined over three dozen other organizationsin an open letter urging the province to provide more funding.

Severalsites in Ontario are at risk of closingat the end of March and more were hoping to open through an application process which has been put on hold.

"During the provincial moratorium on applications, we cannot proceed on a Cambridge CTS application," Ruth Cameron, executive director of the AIDS Committee of Cambridge, Kitchener, Waterloo andArea(ACCKWA) saidin an email statement to CBC News.

"If responded to, the requests in the letter will enable ACCKWA to proceed on an application for Cambridge."

The Canadian Drug Policy Coalition wrote an open letter to Minister of Health Sylvia Jones andAssociate Minister of Mental Health and Addictions Michael Tibolloon March 5.ACCKWAwas among 51 other groups to sign the letter.

Ontario paused approval of new CTSapplicationsafter it launcheda review of all 17 sites aftera 44-year-old mother of two was killed by a stray bullet near a consumption site in Toronto's east end in the summer of 2023.

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Health said the review includes consultations withpublic health and community engagement, as well as reviewing complaints againstconsumption sites.

"These reviews remain ongoing and will inform the next steps taken by the Ministry of Healthincluding funding, location and application decisions. All new applications remain on pause," the spokesperson said.

Communities waiting years for application approval

The letter said communities like Sudbury, Barrie, Windsor,Timmins and Hamilton have been waiting years for their submitted applications to be approved.

"These delays are unacceptable and deadly," the coalition said in its letter.

Cambridge city council approved the location for a CTS at 150 Main St.in the fall of 2021.

ACCKWA stepped up to run the site in 2022 and has sincebeen working with the region's public health and the Cambridge North Dumfires Ontario Health Teamto send its application to the province.

The coalition's letterisasking for a meeting with Minister Jones on March 13, as well asan expedited 30-day timeline for responding to applications in the interim and to phase out the current CTSapproach tosupervised consumption services.

The NDP's health critic France Glinas, says the province's pause on new applications discriminates against people who have mental health and addiction needs.

"I ask, what is the mandate of this committee who does this [review]? Who is in charge of this?" she said in an interview with CBC News.

"We know that consumption and treatment sites are an integral part of keeping people alive through this overdose epidemic that people are living through in Cambridge, like in Sudbury."