Task force proposed to support addiction response at Hamilton libraries

Hamilton Public Library officials say they need more help addressing the opioid crisis along York Boulevard.

The number of overdoses at the Central branch is staggering, and library staff are often responsible for administering life-saving measures.

In the first five weeks of this year, library staff responded to 45 overdoses. While no deaths occurred, library and mental health officials are hoping to team up with other agencies to significantly reduce those figures.

In March, the library launched a two-month pilot project requiring library card access to address the frequency of drug overdoses inside the central branch.

“Really what it is is just to make sure that anyone coming into the library is willing to say, ‘I’m Paul, and I’m going to be accountable for my behavior,'” said Paul Takala, chief librarian of the Hamilton Public Library.

Gagan Batra, board chair of the Hamilton Public Library, said the challenges make it difficult to maintain a safe environment for staff to work or for the public to use the space.

“Because of these challenges, it was very difficult for us to create that kind of inclusive, safe and secure environment for staff to do their work, but also for anybody who is using our space,” Batra said.

While officials say the pilot project has brought the number of overdoses down, they maintain a serious problem persists.

“I think we’re facing a lot of the social challenges similar to what the city is facing,” Batra said. “Right now we’re in the thick of it with the opioid crisis, dealing with a lot of the challenges with open drug use in our library space — lots of things that are happening on York Boulevard that, during the day, spill over into our library space.”

WATCH MORE: Hamilton library card access pilot shows early drop in incidents, concerns remain

On Wednesday, library officials and the CEO of the Canadian Mental Health Association of Hamilton asked councillors at a general issues committee meeting for more support, potentially through a task force involving other local agencies.

“We’re hoping to make sure that council understands the seriousness of the toxic drug crisis and how it’s impacting our downtown and other parts of the city,” Takala said. “We want to make sure that we’re working together to get supports for people.”

Mayor Andrea Horwath described the statistics as frightening.

“They’re getting worse. The crisis deepens,” Horwath said. “The collaboration from other orders of government continues to be absent, so we need to do everything we can to pull together to find solutions locally that bring in partners and create opportunity.”

The issues are not contained to the Central branch. Library officials say the Barton Street branch is seeing similar problems. While CHCH News was on site, a man was observed cleaning up discarded drug paraphernalia outside the library.

Takala noted that the well-known drug problems on Barton Street often impact the vicinity of the library.

“It can become a deterrent for families wanting to go to the library because of the activity they see around it,” Takala said.

The drug issue has already forced operational changes. Funding has been diverted from literacy programs to address the crisis at the Central branch, and the children’s section has been moved to the second floor to distance children from the drug activity occurring on York Boulevard.

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