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[Music]
you're
live good afternoon everyone welcome to
the work session today is Monday October
28th 2024 it is a approximately 100 p.m.
I am mayor proen bomo mayor Enriquez is
um out of town at a municipal League
conference today we will start with a
moment of silence for the brave men and
women of the United States armed forces
as they protect our interest around the
globe as well as the courageous men and
women of the Los Cruses police
department and the Los cruus Fire
Department
thank you and just little housekeeping
since it's just four of us today um hold
your bio breaks or we will have to take
a pause um in the meeting
um first up today is jobs of the week
Sarah come on
up good afternoon thank
you there we go all right for jobs of
the week for October 28th last week of
October we have the gas welding gas
systems welder for the city of Los cruus
that when pays 2582 an hour and is a
continuous posting at this time we also
have a grant development and compliance
specialist that one starts at 49,000 and
is a continuous posting as well we have
a deputy program manager at Oasis
systems at we Sand Missile Range that
one that posting closes on
1120 we have um several postings for
cablecom LLC things um post openings
from billing specialist Foreman labor
project coordinator and there's several
others that they have listed so if
you're interested in cablecom um you'll
need to check out the listings that are
listed
online um we have a dialysis patient
care technician for us Renal Care that
one closes on the 17th of November also
a road technician one for Sun Belt
Rentals that one starts at 1845 and the
posting closes on November
17th and then as always you can find us
on employ nm.com if you want to check
out any of the those postings especially
like the one that was listed several
openings for cablecom you can come down
to the office at 226 South Elam
Boulevard thank you all thank you Sarah
yes ma'am and next up is pets of the
week with Carol
neelson good afternoon I am Carol Nelson
digital content specialist with Animal
Services Center of the msia valley uh
our cat of the week is noodle number
80032 if you would like to look him up
online at almost 4 months old I am at
that perfect age where everything is a
delightful mystery waiting to be
explored I'm not just about curiosity
though I'm also a big fan of snuggles
and purring when I'm not on a little
Adventure you can usually find me
soaking up all the love I can get I
thrive on companionship I would love to
have a human or two who can shower me
with affection let's make some wonderful
m memories together and our dog of the
week is Sammy uh number
59108 I might be a little shy at first
but underneath this timid exterior is a
heart bursting with love just waiting to
shine I spent a bit of time in shelter
and while I appreciate the care I
receive sometimes the hustle and bustle
can be a bit overwhelming for me if
there is a lot going on I can be a
little shy and hesitant but don't let
that fool you when I'm given the chance
to enjoy some one-on-one time my true
personality starts to Blossom let's take
it slow together and create a bond that
shines and this coming weekend we have
our picnic with a pup um we're going to
be doing a little bit of a Dia deos smto
theme and so we're honoring animals that
have passed on and also celebrating the
animals that we can still adopt so we
would encourage everyone to come on out
um and adopt a new friend um there's
going to be food music and should be a
good time and as always we are on social
media you can also visit our website for
more information any animals that you
want more information on and yeah that's
everything have a good day thank you so
much first up on our work session agenda
is item 3.1 overdose prevention center
we will be joined by K kayn C via Zoom
Athena Huckabee and Philip fui who are
here
good afternoon is uh kayn
available let's see Adrien is our Zoom
guest I have not seen anybody pop into
the zoom uh participation as of
now okay can I check with her or should
I just riff until uh she shows up we can
do the other item first and then um come
back to you if you want to get if you
want to reach out and I will do that
thank you perfect thank you for your
flexibility okay 3.2 city of Las Cruses
economic Outlook uh Dr Monica
Torres thank you Mr Mayor and members of
City Cil my name is Monica Thor
Economist Economist with economic
development and I will give you an econ
economic summary from the first quarter
on fiscal year
25 during the first two months of the c
or the fiscal year oh do I do something
with
okay thank you Dr Torres maybe we'll
just wait a little
bit you want me
to um you can minimize it because we
will just continue with your
presentation okay since we've already
started perfect so during the first two
months of the first quarter of the
current year uh more people joined the
low Force employment remain pretty much
the same and the number of people
actively looking for a job Rose 18% to a
total of 2.6 th000 persons the
unemployment rate uh ticked up from
about 4.5 from a previous year to a 5.3
this was expected given the restricted
policy environment in the
nation um during the first two months of
the fiscal year the AAS listing price r
1% from about 349,000 to 353,000 and
according to the cost of living index
during the second quarter of 2024 the
city was about 11% less expensive than
the average of the participating
cities during the first quarter of the
Year current fiscal year there were nine
additional business registrations a
compar as compared to the previous year
to a total of 15
48 and in the Nation the average 30-year
mortgage rate declined from about 7% to
6.5% but remains about the 3.7% before
the pandemic and the federal funds rate
which is the Benchmark for other baring
cost was 350 basis points to a range
between five um 475 to
5% this is the First Rate cut after a
number of rate increases to tame
inflation which pick in mid 2020 at
9% the median rate is expected to be
about
3.4% at the end of
2025 uh yourt Revenue Rose about 1.8%
from about 32.2 million to
32.8 during the business months that
correspond to the this distribution
month period inflation grew 3%
uh in regards to match taxable gross
reips which is a measure of economic
activity where tax payments are matched
to um reported receipts the O industry
sectors grew about
1.6% um from about 1.02 billion to
1.04 the top three industry sectors that
contribute to the masch taxable growth
receives in the city are retail trade
Healthcare and social assistance and
construction together during this period
they accounted for
57% retail trade is about 32% Healthcare
uh 14% And construction 12% from this
three sectors retail trade and
Healthcare declin while construction
Rose about
12% from 18 sectors 11 sectors grew on a
year-by-year basis uh unclassified
establishments grew at the fastest clip
while transportation and warehousing
decline about
24% in regards to cannabis um there was
a excise tax there was an increase of
about about 133% which is about uh to a
total of about
200,000 in regards to sales sales
decline total sales decline about 4%
from 9.3 million to 9 million on one
hand we have adal du sales which um
Rose about 2.4% to a total of 6.2
million on the other hand medical use
which is about 30% of the total sales
decline about 15% to a total of
2.7 the aage shl per transaction dropped
12% from about
$36 to
31 uh and the total number of tickets
Rose
10% looking ahead um in the nation
inflation has been trending down there's
beenin of softening on the labor market
the FED fund rates was three 50 bases
point in September and the expectation
is to continue to reduce this rate if
incoming data comes as
expected uh also the current tax code
will expire at the end of
2025 so this are among some of the
factors that can impact household and
business investment decisions therefore
we expect the economic growth to
continue to to continue but um at more
moderate pce as compared to recent
fiscal
years that concludes my presentation if
you have any
questions thank you Dr Torres any
questions from Council doesn't look like
it thank you are there any questions
from the public on this
item doesn't look like it thank you Dr
Torres okay back to overdose prevention
center
um Ken C do we have you on Zoom
yet it doesn't seem like it she said in
about four or five minutes okay we got
confused between Mountain Time and
Pacific Time totally get it do you want
to get us started with anything sure I
can begin the introduction um I really
appreciate the opportunity to be here
please don't forget to state your name
my name is Philip fudy uh spelled FIU t
y and um I'm here uh along with theena
hucke and a few others that are
interested in putting forth a
recommendation for an overdose
prevention center um and I
know uh as part of a way of it as an
introduction to our guest speaker
um just tell you a little bit about
myself I am a uh have been uh in New
Mexico for 40 years uh currently reside
here in Los cruus and uh have been
involved in providing harm reduction
programming and services here in New
Mexico uh for the last oh 25 to 30 years
um I'm not here representing uh my
current employers today but
uh am interested in putting together uh
a pilot project uh for what we're
calling overdose prevention centers and
I know that a lot of people know uh what
that is but when we're talking about
that
it's uh it's an intervention that has
popped up out of a a a need for the
there she is need to uh be able to
address the crisis of overdose
death in the United States and elsewhere
and has
been uh very successful in Canada and
Australia and Europe and other places
and most
recently uh in New York uh where uh
Kalin had the uh opportunity to be uh
the
operations manager and help get that
program up off the ground and so having
someone with some EXP experience with
that we thought would be a great way to
introduce the topic um I would like to
say as a uh I don't often lean into this
in public context but as a person in
long-term recovery
myself um My Accidental career in harm
reduction uh has had me uh kind of
dragged and kicking most of the way uh
when I first
uh succeeded in getting through rehab in
the 1990s I got recruited to work um in
harm reduction providing needle exchange
and and Outreach and I thought it was a
horrible idea um but after doing the
work uh which at that time was still
very much focused on HIV prevention and
hepatitis C
um uh I it gradually began to open my
eyes about that but uh in the early
2000s when I was doing this work for the
Department of Health I uh I was again we
started doing nxone and I was against
the idea of nasal nxone um and that
ended up being the Naran that we all are
familiar with today um
I was opposed to uh most recently to
adulterant checking as an idea when we
first when my colleagues first started
talking about it and that's the work
that I'm doing in New Mexico today and
when my colleagues started talking about
overdose prevention centers uh in the
middle of the last decade I also thought
that that didn't sound like a very good
idea to me but I have not been able to
turn my back on the evidence and the
experience of those doing the work um I
think everybody likes the uh word crisis
when we talk about substance user
overdose death or fenel because there's
a lot of money attached to it but
people aren't really willing to uh look
at the science and look at the evidence
and be willing to take some risks um and
treat it as if it's really a crisis so
with that I would like to introduce kayn
because I see her on there she's going
to talk for about oh 15 to 20 minutes
and then hello hello be available to
take
questions hi Kaylin can you hear
us mayor protm she had sent a chat I saw
pop up that said she couldn't hear us so
I don't know if Adrien
can work that out
I don't know what hi Kaylin can you hear
us okay great good um I'm going to hand
it over to you now please make sure to
introduce
yourself oh now we can't hear
[Music]
you uh one second how's that
better yes that's better you can hear me
okay yes all right great hi everyone
thank you so much for having me my name
is kayn C uh I'm the former senior
director of programs for Ono NYC in New
York City where I oversaw the
development and impl implementation of
the two overdose prevention centers
there I was their senior director for
eight years uh and did a lot of uh sort
of community engagement work with law
enforcement sanitation Parks elected
officials to uh ready both Washington
Heights and Harlem for the
implementation of Overdose prevention
centers in both neighborhoods I left on
point in June and uh hauled my family
across the country uh for a new position
in Los Angeles where I'm now on the
leadership team for homeless Healthcare
Los Angeles uh operating in skid row and
MacArthur Park uh working with uh
stakeholders there to ready those
neighborhoods for the implementation of
Overdose prevention centers and other
arm ruction
initiatives previously um before coming
to the US in 2016 I worked in Vancouver
Canada for over a decade building and
operating harm reduction programs there
um and that's just a little bit of my
history and I'm really thrilled to be
here with you I'm going to share my
screen
now let's
see oops sorry there's always a little
bit of technical difficulties here one
sec all right everyone can see
this
okay so um as mentioned I uh was the
lead on developing and implementing the
first yes if you could just give us a
minute because there's this weird gray
block right in the middle of your
presentation however we also have it so
per perhaps we can show it from here and
maybe um philli or Athena one of you can
oh never
mind okay you know what we're Trucking
along you may begin
now uh technical issues for the win um
okay so I wanted to start uh with
talking a little bit about some of the
Lessons Learned uh through the launch of
the two opcs in New York City
specifically and the biggest takeaway
for me and certainly the partners that
we worked with to launch the sites was
that an overdose prevention center if
implemented properly really will
effectively meet the needs of two
stakeholder groups definitely the
participants who rely on the site for
their life-saving services but they also
have to meet as well as they can the
various needs of the communities at
large where they're located so that's
residents families business
City stakeholders law enforcement
Etc the other lesson learned is that
when we look at interventions like
overdose prevention
centers this is sort of the great
unregulated area of addiction treatment
at the moment and if the answer is no to
a particular question around an OPC or
the standing up of a harm ruction
program why is the answer no and does it
have to be some examples of that would
be engaging par professionals to help
share the labor of some of the Fallout
of the overdose crisis and I'll give
some examples of that in a second or
really uh prioritizing a PA professional
response to reduce the burden on
emergency services and law enforcement
officials this sort of is related to the
following point which is that in in this
area of work the law has always been
slow to catch up to Public Health um
what do I mean by that there was a time
where we thought it would be impossible
to get medication assisted treatment or
bpan orine into prisons medication
behind bars there was no way the deas
were ever going to allow this and now of
course it's a best practice another
example would be nxone you couldn't get
Noone without a prescription you
couldn't administer nxone if you weren't
a clinician and now of course you know
no loone is available over the counter
without a prescription and we are widely
doing our very best to get in the lock
Zone into the hands of lay responders
across the country so this is another
area where Public Health policy has been
slow to catch up to the law syringe
exchange is another obvious
example law enforcement officials in New
York City and in other jurisdictions
that are adopting uh overdose prevention
centers are kind of saying and Tracy uh
Chief Tobin in New York City has
famously said you know this is going to
be a no-brainer in five years we are
just slow low to catch up to the
particular role that these centers play
in the addiction treatment Continuum of
Care for people who use
drugs another lesson we've learned here
in the United States is that collocation
works best for an overdose prevention
center it's helpful if the OPC itself is
located with other services that meet
the acute and emerging needs of people
who use drugs this could be uh sterile
supply distribution Medical Care Mental
Health Care
direct linkage into addiction treatment
and we'll talk about that more in a
second hygiene Services laundry showers
things like this and the last thing and
I think everyone here knows this that
opcs are not the Panacea they are not
the single thing that is going to get us
out of this crisis but they are a really
critical part of the solution um you
know the absence Community doesn't like
when we say this but it's true you know
harm reduction is the net harm reduction
is what catch is people who fall out of
abstinence so abstinence fails every
single time except for the one time it
doesn't and harm reduction is the net
that catches people keeps them alive and
ensures they have um you know they have
their life to try again whether it be
towards abstinence maintenance or or
whatever else they might be
pursuing so specifically related to the
New York context I'm going to focus on
that for the purposes of this
presentation because I'm I'm pretty new
to La still
what does Ono do I think many of you
probably know this but yes we do operate
to very busy safer consumption programs
but it does a lot more um we have two
harm reduction hubs one in Washington
Heights and one in East Harlem and that
is where the opcs are collocated with a
bunch of other services I'm going to
tell you about now we also operate seven
Vehicles including a Mobile Medical unit
that also has safer consumption on it
really getting to the idea that if
you're going to open an overdose
prevention center your outward facing
programming that is on the ground in the
community working with uh Civic agencies
and other stakeholders is just as
important as the OPC itself they can't
exist in isolation of each
other we operate three Outreach and
Public Safety teams which has their own
Public Safety hotline I'm a big believer
in the value of uh taking labor off of
overburdened plates and the way that
harm reduction programs can do this the
public safety hotline is one example of
this in New York City if you see someone
overdosing or there's somebody who's
setting up in your alcob of your
business or there's syringe uh litter
all over the playground if you call 311
they're so overburdened they can't
respond sometimes within 72 hours we saw
a real opportunity to be helpful there
so we opened our own Public Safety
hotline that that promised a response
within an hour of receiving the call so
how can we take work off of overburdened
plates in other parts of the city
infrastructure we also operate our own
harm reduction mental health unit really
acknowledging the gap between addiction
treatment and mental health services and
needing to close that Gap to ensure
people are getting the care that they
need drug checking we operate two mass
spectrometers as well as seven testing
strips our own clinical and nursing care
including uh nurse practitioners
psychiatric nurse practitioners MDS
registered nurses Etc a holistic
Services Program a respit program for
people who need to sleep during the day
um we know that sleep or exhaustion is a
major contributor to Addiction in mental
health and if we can get people to sleep
that is hugely
helpful and then digging into that just
a tiny bit more before we move on to the
opcs themselves you can see that list
here is is really all of the other
ancillary programming that supports the
opcs and these are some pictures of what
the sites in New York look like so you
can see that they're bright they're big
they're dignified spaces where people
who use drugs will want to hang out so
Optics are very important when we do
this work we don't want the sites to
look like people would expect them to
look if it looks like a shooting gallery
that's the kind of reception that we're
going to get from law enforcement
Emergency Services uh and other
stakeholders in the neighborhood if it
looks like a well-run clean organized
and dignified space then we're suddenly
more welcome as a legitimate uh member
of the larger
Community I want to point out here too
before we move on volunteers and jobs
you'll see that 40 plus there what that
means is that we really believe that one
of the best things we can do for the
neighborhood is create work for people
in the neighborhood so local jobs for
local people we are an income generator
we are providing jobs for people that
need them and we're also hiring into
full-time salar positions with medical
benefits people who use drugs directly
from the opcs and other programs so
really interrupting the cycle of
addiction with other opportunities that
are all coming out of the program itself
so this idea of closed loop service
provision yes we want to deal with your
immediate risk of loss of life because
of your addiction we're going to do some
of that overdose prevention work but
we're also going to help you achieve
some of the other goals that you want
for yourself like a job or reunification
with family or stabilizing your mental
health these kinds of
things I'm going quickly because I know
that I think I've got about 20 minutes
and then I want you to ask questions if
you have
any so for the opcs themselves couple
things just so we're all talking about
the same thing um you can use any
substance you want in any quantity you
want via any mode of administration so
we're not policing substance or quanti
quantity of substance and that's a
unique feature of our opcs in New York
we don't provide the drugs just want to
make sure we're all clear on that that's
not the area of the industry that we're
in although on point and many of the
harm reduction organizations across the
United States are uh advocating for
something called safe Supply so this
would be prescription grade Alternatives
that limit people's need to rely on the
heavily adulterated and toxic drug
Supply in the United States really
bringing them into the medic medical
system via their use as opposed to
continuing to kind of build the wall
between their substance use and
engagement with medical
care we do permit splitting in our sites
and that's also an unusual feature this
is one of our redresses to the
encroachment of drug transacting
activities and um sort of uh boosting
stealing Etc from local businesses um
this allows people to go in on a a do do
of drugs uh and split it in the site
which limits the amount of money they
need to purchase that dose there are any
other questions about that I'm very
happy to answer them but I'm going to
move on from that point uh in the
interest of time uh we do provide safer
use assistance which means we help
people understand the mechanics of safer
injection uh which gets at some of the
downstream Health impacts including
endocarditis skin and soft tissue
infections uh and other things that can
be quite ruinous to the person's
physical body if they don't know how to
administer drugs safely so this is a
public health intervention that often
gets stuck in people's minds as uh an
example of enabling when for us it's
it's very counter to that it's if I
leave you here butchering your body and
engaging in all of these safe practices
the likelihood that you could have a
really detrimental sort of cardiac
infection or abscess possibly even lose
a limb goes up and our job is to get you
through a period of substance use as
close to intact as possible really
taking care of the central nervous
system um and the cardiac system the
respiratory system and then the rest of
the of the person's body no time limits
in our sites I don't want to be timed
when I have a shower in the morning and
get ready for work and so too for our
folks they do not want to be timed when
they're engaging this activity this
helps lower anxiety and it also means we
have a captive audience for the duration
of the time that people are in our site
that captive audience is engaging in the
one activity that is compelling them in
that moment and when you allow them to
do that by extension they are more
willing to engage in further care so
this is what we call booths side care
it's not enabling but when you
acknowledge that the drug use is going
to happen whether you like it or not and
they can engage in that activity
suddenly we can do a housing application
in the booth at the same time we can
have a a session with a psychiatrist we
can talk about borine we can do wound
care all of this other stuff can be
added on to an instance of use that
these are not mutually exclusive ideas
so the idea of boo side care and
eliminating the time limits to ensure
that we have that captive audience the
average duration of a visit to our
Washington Heights location is 58
minutes that's almost an hour the
average duration uh of a visit to our
site in Harlem is 35 when you consider
that we see people multiple times a day
you start to get a picture of the unique
level of access that we have to this
population directly through the overdose
prevention center
itself we train our staff to respond at
the same level and in the same way as a
registered nurse would in any drug
involved medical emergency but they are
not registered nurses so this idea of
giving clinical and Professional
Training to paraprofessional people I am
telling you the impact of this Staffing
strategy and approach has been
instrumental to our excess success in
the rooms and has been the number one
way that we've been able to take work
off of Em's plate and keep people out of
the emergency
room I'm going to move past this I think
there we go just a couple pictures this
is the site in Washington Heights if you
haven't seen it this is our consumer
ummer lead site what that means is
everyone working on the team in
Washington Heights also uses the
facility as well so this is the peer or
consumer-led
model here's the site in Harlem this is
what would be referred to as the medical
model everyone working on this team has
some level of Medical Training or
adjacent experience some are FLOTUS
certified medical assistants uh former
EMTs and nurses this program
is a high volume inhalation program so
on the bottom two squares of your SE uh
screen you can see an example of the
inhalation room that can hold up to six
smokers at a time and then this site has
eight
booths since we launched in November
2021 we've registered over 5,000 people
5,500 people to B site Harlem is the
larger cohort by far with over over
4,000 people registered to that program
the sites have been used this data is a
little bit old it's about a month and a
half old but they've been used over
160,000 times so that's aund thou
160,000 instances of public drug use
that have been picked up out of the
public sphere and put down somewhere
safe private and dignified with
immediate connection into other care
should that be of interest to people I
want to say too that number 5500 people
every single one of them 100% of them
has engaged with traditional treatment
at least once if not multiple times some
of them several dozen times uh our
oldest participant in New York is in
their 80s and that individual in
particular has been in and out of
treatment multiple times I want to
broaden the addiction treatment
Continuum idea to include overdose
prevention centers this is a kind of
treatment we are engaging people who are
previously not interacting with
Healthcare other than via the emergency
room usually through an overdose
instance or some other egregious uh you
know ailment or illness resulting from
their drug use we are interrupting that
cycle safety stabilization and
engagement once you have someone engaged
in an overdose prevention center and no
longer in the peak and Valley survival
drug use patterns that are very very
common uh for Street entrenched
substance use you start to develop a
pathway towards stability when you are
more stable and practicing something
that looks a little bit more like
maintenance use you are now a much
better candidate for Medical Care Mental
Health Care housing employment you're a
better parent to your kids so much else
becomes possible through the
stabilization that these programs offer
but first and foremost of course of
course the initial impetus for these
sites is engagement and
safety since launch the team has
intervened in this is closer I think
this is upwards around 1,800 overdoses
no one has died and I want you to notice
there in the bottom the the green box
around 50 ambulance calls has resulted
in nearly 1,800 overdose interventions
so this is the proof in the pudding this
is that high LEL
of training for staff really emboldening
them with the skills that they need to
intervene effectively so that we don't
have to call 911 and activate that
system we are intervening in the entire
overdose in a closed loop within our
sites without having to engage external
stakeholders I'm not sure what it's like
in New Mexico but in New York City if
you call over
to
an Ken you're starting
to cut away in your we can't really hear
you maybe try turning off your
camera off the
C we were hearing you just fine and then
all of a sudden we were not
let me
try better yes go
ahead do you need me
to
anything um I'm going to keep going now
you sound a little bit far away Adrien I
don't know if you can help us with the
tech issues
can you say something else real quick
Ken
absolutely okay I think we should be
okay
okay am I okay
to I'm not I don't think so I think you
keep cutting out unfortunately give us a
second we have someone here working on
figuring it
out
okay Kylie can you go ahead and speak
for me just count one
two
one five
okay check the
server one second
everyone
e
e e
you're welcome to she can try again all
right kayen it seems like everything on
our end is
okay if you want to try starting over
from this one not the whole thing
obviously from this
slide
okay all right just
check okay Ken if you're speaking we
cannot hear
you
uhoh all
right
maybe hello okay go on can you hear me
yes yes we
can oh you're on mute now
all right I'm just going to stop the
share and then reshare to just um reboot
from where we were okay you we can hear
you now pretty clear okay
wonderful okay we're still okay yes okay
great um so I I'm not sure where we lost
each other here um but I just will
highlight the few things I want you to
take from this slide which is really the
approximately 50 ambulance calls that
resulted from over 1,600 overdose
interventions and these are serious
fenal adulterated overdoses that because
of the high level of training we're
giving the staff and our proximity to
the incident that we're there the second
symptomology presents we're able to keep
all of this out of the emergency room
and off the plate of EMS so we are not
calling 91 one at on point and less
indicated we are really prioritizing
resolving everything to the best of our
ability on site um for these 50
ambulance calls um this is often with
people who have underlying medical
conditions are older certainly people
who have
COPD but the team has generally resolved
the overdose itself I also want to bring
your attention to the red box which is
the opioid and depressant involved
overdoses and you'll notice that nxone
was used only 18% of the time and we're
not you might be
familiar and we're not
you with the
injectable
one all right Ken we're back to losing
you um perhaps we can just
try presenting from here and you can
close out your presentation and
um got it give yourself some bad with um
Phillip
or um Athena would you like to come up I
think the presentation is loaded up on
here will you maybe help him Christine
Christine will come find it for you okay
thanks everyone for your patience
not yeah and you're even just now sort
of freezing a bit caiten so maybe
continue to turn off your camera
okay so we have the presentation up and
if you will'll have
Phillip take it to
slide 10 I believe 10 there we go and we
can hear pretty good and if you just
want to tell them when to change slides
that will will make it work beautiful
okay thank you for being a co-pilot here
and so sorry for these technical
difficulties everyone and um you were
speaking about nxone when you cut out
last yes okay thank you for the nudge um
so in the red box you can see that nxone
was only used 8 18% of the time and I
hope you heard that we're not using the
nasal formulation we're uh micro doing
in 01 increments with the injectable
formulation and only when indicated what
this means is that we're not putting
people into precipitated withdrawal um
which is often the case when when using
a larger dose of nxone and when people
are not in precipitated withdrawal
they're not ill and bouncing away from
the site why is this important all we're
doing is trying to achieve medical
stability once the person is medically
stable they still could be fairly Under
the Influence but they stay and they
convalesce with us what can sometimes
happen uh especially with EMS response
to an overdose or law enforcement
response to an overdose is that the
person is given a high dose of nxone and
they run off into the community they
refuse ambulance Care Medical Care the
nxone wears off and the overdose comes
back by limiting the use of Noone and
emphasizing oxygen we are ensuring that
people stay within the site as opposed
to bouncing out into community in a
state of intoxication or on the
precipice possibly of a more serious uh
drug involved medical
emergency we can go to the next
slide so what does this mean in terms of
cost savings for emergency services
hospital and the police going back to
that idea of taking labor off of
overburdened plates it's estimated that
the cost savings just from diverted EMS
and er admissions is over 30
million we have an evaluation happening
funded by the National Institute of drug
abuse um and one of the aims is looking
at the financial impact of an overdose
prevention center so this analysis will
be happening as a part of the
evaluation and will be including cost
savings to the New York City Police
Department as a part of that evaluation
we haven't even calculated it because
it's just a little off the charts how
much money is being saved by these
systems next please
so just talking very briefly again about
the community engagement portion of the
work and how it's really crucial that
the outward facing work mirror the work
that happens at the overdose prevention
center so a well-run program will
integrate within the tapestry of the
neighborhood what that means is that
it's taking into account those dual sets
of needs the program participants who
are going to use it but also the
communities where it's located so the
ambassadorship piece here is key we
partner really closely with law
enforcement because we have to the
success of the site and our ability to
do the work in community depends on it
we partner with NYPD in a couple of
different ways one we go on joint
Outreach two they don't want to be
policing low-level hand-to-hand sales
and people who are in the midst of a
mental health crisis we can take that
work off of their plate so law
enforcement in New York actually asked
us to develop a card demonstrating that
we are working in partnership with law
enforcement that law enforcement could
give to people who use substances on the
street and say hey whatever you're doing
here don't do it here go to on point and
we can take you there so really doing
what looks like lowlevel diversion work
with people who use drugs in community
so that law enforcement doesn't have to
do it we have kind of dual crises
unfolding in all of our cities and towns
across Ross the US which is the
addiction crisis and the Mental Health
crisis law enforcement is getting hit
from both sides as is emergency services
and low threshold harm reduction
programming has a really critical role
to play in taking some of that work off
of those plates the other thing I'll
mention quickly is our Harlem site is
across the street from a daycare
literally 35 feet from a daycare center
you would think that the daycare would
be like just out for blood um asking for
the center to our Center to close when
in fact they're one of our most
staunched defenders in the public realm
how is that why is that how can a such a
busy overdose prevention center coexist
with a daycare program um in 2024 today
it's for a couple reasons it's because
we meet each other's needs so one of the
things we're doing is creating jobs for
the parents of those children um and we
also have leadership at the daycare who
has been been in Harlem for many many
years since the80s who has watched this
crisis unfold on their doorstep for
decades so this idea of collective
responsibility and collaboration we
didn't cause the overdose crisis we are
here to redress it and we want to do
that in partnership with the other
people who are impacted by the crisis
including families Educators Etc another
thing we did was host interns from the
local high school a block and a half
away from our site in Washington Heights
these are people who young people who
want to go into medicine or public
health who are getting really valuable
exposure to harm reduction and other
learning opportunities through the
presence of an OPC in their not in their
community so seeing the OPC and the
introduction of these Services as a
value ad to the community not a
detraction next slide
please through the outward facing work
of course we need to keep keep our parks
and public spaces clear clean and safe
for everyone and this is a part of the
public injection diversion program which
is really Central to the ethos of an
overdose prevention center none of the
supplies that we give out in the OPC
leave the room it all stays in the room
and is safely disposed of in the room
but the outward facing programming is
taking care of whatever use is
continuing to happen outside because our
sites are not 24 hours yet so since
launch they diverted over 2.5 million
ion units of hazardous waste from Parks
and public spaces uh in the
neighborhoods where we operate so
continuing to feed people into the
program who are still out in community
and really delivering that uh emergency
on the ground care for both people who
use drugs and other stakeholders in the
in the neighborhoods where we operate
next slide
please and I think that's it I think
with the technical delays we're far over
20 minutes I I really apologize but if
are any questions I'm I'm very happy to
receive them thank you so much no no
worries thank you for your patience and
thank all of you as well thank you for
the presentation I will open it up to
council questions
now yes councelor Corin thank you thank
you for your presentation and bringing
this up um and I'm a public health
person so I'm here for always here for
harm reduction I'm I'm curious I think
and this is more of a question really
for like Athena and Phil in in this and
us for this conversation but I think um
we are having ongoing opioid funding
sort of conversations about what we're
going to use for that I'm wondering what
the next steps are for when we're going
to hear some of those additional
recommendations if I'm hoping that this
can be and it seems like it's alluded to
in the documentation that we've that
we've received so far but not spe
specific in detailed as this
presentation was but I'm curious what
when the next opioid conversation might
be and if we can also consider um this
in connection with that conversation
too hi my name is Athena Huckabee um I'm
a public health professional here in Las
crusis and I also sit on the opioid
settlement advisory Council um those
meetings are ongoing uh we actually have
a um we've been meeting monthly for
several months and we have a meeting
coming up on November 4th where what we
are trying to line out is um both the
programs that we would like to see
funded and the ways that we would like
to track the success of those programs
so I think before we bring a full Suite
of recommendations to you we want to
understand how we're going to measure
the success of those programs we're
hoping to line that out on November 4th
and then be a little bit closer to
having ironed out recommendations that
everyone agrees on to bring um that
being said I'm not sure that overdose
prevention centers are um necessarily we
are talking of course about harm
reduction and recovery and many other
things but I don't think that we're
talking uh spe specifically in that
group about an overdose prevention
center that being said I do of course
Envision that the opioid settlement
funds could be very easily used to fund
a pilot project of something of this
nature thank you that's I was just
wondering the context of all of those
things and I I I interpret the documents
that I've read so far as being pretty
open to this type of conversation too so
um so I think to me that I just want to
elevate that I hope that we can continue
this conversation and in that context as
well so thank you and thank you again
for being on the committee and
representing and bringing your expertise
in a number of domains to that to that
conversation abolutely thanks thank you
councelor anyone else sure go ahead
councelor mclair thank you for your
presentation I had a question this might
be more of a brad SL Chief story
question what are some legality issues
that we might have with something like
this in is there a state issue are there
City issues that we might have that we
need need to overcome or the things
would this work in the
city Brad is
that uh mayor protm uh councelor McClure
uh I I don't want to go too deeply into
the issue in an open Forum but of course
the issues that I'm always looking at uh
are in regard to both liability and
legality what I can say here in the open
Forum today is that chapter 24 of our
state code at least appears to
contemplate the legality of these
overdose uh prevention centers but it's
also my understanding that the New
Mexico State Legislature uh probably
intends to uh
introduce uh
more robust uh legislation regarded to
that especially with regard to
limitation of
liability thank
you that's it anyone else um I just
speak to that issue sure kaen go ahead
one quick thing to add to that um I I
see that the the City attorney just made
comment um you know the city of New York
had to and core council at the city of
New York had to Grapple with this issue
and and one of the concerns was being
defunded at a federal level um if the
city of New York chose to support the
sites um especially given that the
governor um was seeming to adopt a
stance of non-interference but had no
intention and wasn't signaling that she
intended to legislate uh now or in the
future um and if it's helpful core
counil at New York City is very willing
to talk to other jurisdictions who are
thinking this through through um in
terms of risk and how they mitigated
those risks and the the thought exercise
that they undertook um so I'd be very
happy to connect you if that's of
interest you probably have already
reached out to them but if you haven't
um they're very happy to speak to other
jurisdictions to help with that if if
helpful thanks
kaen um I I don't have any questions
necessarily I just have a couple of
comments I think um uh I you know I am
looking forward to the conversation um
with the opio settlement advisory
committee on why or why not something
like this should be on the list of
recommendations I think um you
know harm reduction strategies are
vitally important in this moment and
more and more people are dying and so we
have to interfere um as boldly and as
best as possible I think something like
this bold uh you know would be best
suited
in um in coordination with our partners
at the county of course I think um it
would function best that way and of
course with a bunch of other
stakeholders I so I do look forward to
that conversation I I I'm happy to have
all of this information as we move into
a potentially joint session with the
county regard regarding the opio
settlement recommendations and then the
last thing I'll say is that there was
there have been a couple pieces of
legislation introduced in the New Mexico
State leg ISL regarding um these kind of
harm reduction strategies and uh one in
2021 and one in 2023 neither of them
have made it out of one of the chambers
um from what I understand just lack of
time um but that there has been momentum
around these and that there have been
some Statewide other Statewide Advocates
who've you know raised this conversation
to the state level so um I also look
forward to following any of that in the
future and um in the January 2025
legislative session to see if any of
these uh pieces of legislation are
reintroduced um but for now I think for
me I I really appreciate having all of
this information and understanding this
especially as we go into the opioid
settlement um joint work session with
the with the county and in potentially a
few weeks or a couple months I'm not
sure so thank you and thanks again Ken I
will open it up to a public comment now
so if there are folks who want to speak
come on up and we will provide 2 minutes
today mayor protim council ju Garcia
this morning there was an article on K
Fox where various parks and L crues were
identified as drug Havens for users
addicts and overdoses something has to
change because citizens of this
community don't deserve this deplorable
environment you want more money for
better bet to better our Parks but itum
to be for criminal activity although my
initial reaction to OPC is no and I did
see the movie loving the age of fanel if
if these centers can be used as a
conduit to treatment forc through the
judicial system or volunteer this may be
an option to consider and And I stress
maybe there have to be consequences and
not just an open-ended Center to
facilitate a illicit drug use and
further enable the the already horrible
human destruction going
on we can't have Las cuses continue to
be a Haven and magnet for homeless
criminals but potentially now with opcs
increased drug users in the city leading
to even more criminal activity thank
you anyone else come on
up two minutes and don't forget to state
your name okay hi my name is Dr Francine
fineberg I spent about 30 years working
with women with substance use disorders
in their children um I actually have
some questions um for kayin one is how
are they funded the other is are they
able to serve pregnant women and is
there any kind of service for people who
have children so that they can go into
your facility and not have to worry
about where their children
are thank you go ahead Ken thank you um
just checking the audio is still okay
yep we can hear you okay great um thank
you for your question um for the first
18 months of our operation we could not
use a single scent of public money for
the operation of the site um and then
the New York City Department of Health
and the City of New York uh figured out
uh following our recommendation a time
and effort budgeting system and that's
how the sites continue to be funded uh a
time and effort budget is a federally
acknowledged budgeting system that
separates activities of a program into
eligible and ineligible activities
against Federal Regulation and federal
law so when we look at the scope of work
and the percentage of Staff time in an
overdose prevention center under this
time and effort structure we see that
98% roughly 98% of Staff labor is spent
doing activities that are eligible under
federal law and according to Federal uh
regulations 2% of Staff time or less um
are spent doing activities that are
ineligible under federal law and that
really comes down to the ACT of
observing consumption itself everything
else is an evidence-based widely
accepted Public Health intervention uh
for people who use drugs even the
observation of consumption is divided
into passive and indirect observation
but when you think about it if you only
have to come up with discretionary money
to fund 2% of Staff time as opposed to
100% of Staff time uh suddenly your
funding options for a site like this
become much broader Rhode Island as you
know is using opioid settlement funds
now New York is using public money to
fund the sites with the exception of the
2% which is funded by discretionary or
Foundation uh money so that's the
funding piece um the budget for on point
by the way is 17 million uh for the
entire organization that's everything
that I showed you uh the opcs themselves
come in around 4 million
um in terms of pregnant people or
pregnant and parenting people who use
drugs and people with dependence yes we
have policies in place for both um I
don't know that we have a ton of time to
get into that but know that policies do
exist for both pregnant people who use
drugs and Pregnant and parenting people
who use drugs um the opcs in New York
have success successfully seen the birth
of three children two parents who did
their pregnancies through the OPC
and two uh of those parents are still
have full custody of their children and
for both this is the first baby that was
not apprehended by social services so a
huge Testament to the role the health
care role that these sites can play in
interrupting addiction patterns for
pregnant and parenting people who use
drugs thanks Ken any other folks from
the
public come on down
thank you City counselors I'm Sarah
Smith I have some serious concerns about
this and the message that it sends to
the public it's basically saying okay
drugs are illegal but you can come and
do them right here and I think that that
creates a very interesting Dynamic that
basically says drugs aren't really
illegal anymore because we will give you
a place where you can come and do them
I'm very concerned that this potentially
increases the number of people who are
doing drugs in the community as well as
what kind of real metrics are used for
this besides how many people didn't
overdose what impact does it have on the
neighborhood what impact does it have on
the city how many of these people
actually become sober and
rehabilitated versus just continuing on
because now they have a comfortable
dignified place to do it you may have
heard that San Francisco is now being
sued right now for a very similar
situation looking at the case which is
in federal court right now which the
city tried to shut down the case and the
judge has said nope the case can proceed
they are specifically having a lawsuit
filed by residents and businesses that
says quote lawmakers created a lawless
living environment by enabling drug
addicts and dealers and they go on to
say that the city's enabling of drug use
has increased Petty and violent crime in
the neighborhood addicts support their
habit by stealing car breaks in robbery
burglaries Etc along with all the other
things that we often see in these types
of neighborhoods and it sounds very
familiar to Desert hope when it first
opened also increasing crime so we've
seen that happen I'm very concerned
about anything else the city might be
funding that is going to have similar
consequences for the people who live
nearby and them having to then deal with
having drug addicts in their
neighborhood very regularly drug addicts
basically as a magnet for them into that
neighborhood and all of the things that
go with that in terms of their Public
Safety their rights to having a safe
neighborhood for their children and a
place to live thank
you anyone else from the
public come on
down good afternoon everyone my name is
Andrew Thomas um I'm going to speak uh
as an expert in Addiction on the fact
that I'm in recovery uh I won't speak
for any of the recovery uh facilities
I've worked for but um for the community
that I take part in most of the addicts
and alcoholics that I speak with don't
want to be addicts or
alcoholics it's not something they
strive for there's a severe fear of
detox and a Severe fear of getting sober
one of the things that medication
assisted treatment helps with is
reducing that fear if we can get people
unafraid of detoxing from the pain and
sometimes death then what we can offer
them is a chance and that's what we're
talking about here is offering people a
chance they're not going to get it if
they're just on the streets they're not
going to get it if they're hanging out
in parks where they have the opportunity
to get it is when they enter a facility
where there Alternatives offered to them
and that's really what we're talking
about here opportunity
and for me sobriety is opportunity it's
the opportunity to do all the things
that I want to do in life instead of
chasing after drugs and
alcohol and uh I'm I'm very passionate
about this and I know Athena and the
other members of this community are too
we're passionate about it for a reason
because we've seen it work that may
sound
anecdotal
but if anecdote is all I have and my
test Tony is that then that's what I'm
going to go by I'm going to go by all of
the people that I've seen it work for
and I think we need to really look into
providing opportunities to people uh
that they don't otherwise get thank you
thank
you yes come on
down
hello May Pro Council my name is Fred
Miller I wanted to say that it seems to
me that people who end up in these
overdose prevention centers they're not
people who are going to be trying to
encourage other people to join them in
doing drugs if anything they're people
who are addressing it on a level they're
not going to be people who want to share
it with new friends that doesn't make
sense to me so I don't think that these
would promote wider drug use
seems to be primeasia it should cut down
on drug use people being treated and
such beyond
that in the presentation kayn C
mentioned discussed the use of small
doses of naloxone instead of large doses
so that gets away from the problem of
people getting treated out on the street
running off refusing treatment and then
the nxone wears off and the the overdose
comes back I glanced over at Chief Smith
at when she brought that up and it
looked like that really hit home for him
like that's that is worthwhile that's
something worth having and in terms
of parks and
streets that was part of
what these prevention centers are taken
care of they're diverting the
needles from the part and streets there
so sounds like a good thing to
me okay thank you thank you anyone else
from the
public what come on down folks if you
want to sit on the front row if you want
to speak or maybe this is our last
one hi um my name is Liz leono um a a
person in recovery as well and um yeah I
uh I came late so I missed a little bit
about of uh the presentation um but uh
overdose prevention centers um I was
just looking at the National Institute
of Health and in their 20 years of data
they have um zero deaths and um that's
really important because having that um
method of um not just uh prevention but
like assertive um like action for people
who are dealing with such an
um such a pervasive
addiction
um uh New Mexico ranks really high in in
our statistics nationally for deaths of
Despair which is alcohol um drug
addiction and
suicide um it shows that nationally we
rank six um for um opioid use deaths or
drug addiction deaths and we rank um
four nationally for um deaths by alcohol
use and as well number four in um deaths
by Suicide um we also are very heavy in
Aces which is adverse childhood
experiences and research has also shown
that um folks who have rank um high in
Aces score um which that's a 10 question
questionnaire that um has had um years
uh Decades of studies in it actually so
folks who uh answer yes for four or more
of those questions um have a
significant um significantly higher
propensity for uh drug and alcohol
addiction um and this is really
important to note because studies in
Asus have also shown that traditional
methods may not always scratch the
surface um everything from like
buiatrics to um like therapy um much
more assertive treatment has definitely
needed so um thank you Liz oh thank
you all right our last person come on
up good afternoon mayor proam City
councilors Chiefs my name is Tanika SOA
Gonzales and I'm a board certified
psychiatric mental health nurse I also
have extensive um lived experience and
so I would like to start this discussion
by saying that um I appreciate the fact
that we're bringing science into this
and facts into this because the reality
is is that this is a medical condition
that affects D2 dopamine receptors and
other receptors so I think we should
have a discussion about this like it's
an illness I also would say to um my
fellow lost crusin that we and Council
that we stop using words that are
pejorative like addict so three years
ago I lost my
father
um who had returned who had returned to
substance use after he lost his sister
who was murdered at the hands of her son
with schizophrenia
my dad died because he didn't know how
to take his
drugs so he's not an addict he's my dad
there are faces to this and there are
people to this and I will just say that
when we had our discussion about
shopping carts Sarah Smith said overall
these strategies aren't working people
need treatment in a safe space to go and
Chief story encouraged us to be not to
not be all or nothing but to have a
balanced approach and so I think that we
use and have this discussion using
science and compassion and stop feeding
into stigma because really what stigma
does is it gives people who feel
insecure and insufficient the
opportunity to otherize people in their
community so that they feel better about
themselves so the next time you walk
past someone and you want to look at
them as just a junkie or just an addict
they belong to somebody they have a
family who loves them and so I would
just encourage us to elevate this
discussion and to really look at the
science behind it and to be open to
talking about how to do new and
different things thank
you thank you Tanika it's a great way to
wrap this up um thank you very much to
our three presenters I I appreciate it
and look forward to continued
conversations on this and if there's
nothing else uh that is our last item
and I'll um take a motion to adjourn so
moved Graham seconded
coren this is on the motion to adjourn
the work session councelor McClure yes
councelor matis is absent councelor
Graham yes councelor
cran yes councelor flotes no I just got
here how could
you well I guess
yes um mayor proam yes and the mayor is
absent
e e