We all know by now that when Gov. Paul LePage makes an unannounced visit to a legislative committee, the whole state of Maine best sit up and take notice.

Still, the Big Guy’s message on Thursday to the Appropriations and Financial Affairs Committee sounded less like Maine’s chief executive getting all gubernatorial and more like Joe Pesci auditioning for a sequel to “Goodfellas.”

“You can agree, disagree, it makes no difference, but every day you’re going to see more dead people,” LePage told the rapt committee. “Every day you’re going to see more guys like ‘Smooth,’ ‘AK’ and ‘PK’ and ‘Scummy’ and ‘Shifty’ coming up from Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania. It’s going to continue.”

Unless, LePage said, the lawmakers come up with the dough to pay for 10 more agents for the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency, along with more drug prosecutors and judges.

And if they don’t?

“You either work with me and give me some agents,” warned LePage, “or I will call the Guard up.”

Advertisement

As in the Maine National Guard. Men and women in desert camouflage versus an endless parade of gun-toting heroin peddlers. So long, Operation Iraqi Freedom. Hello, Operation Hoodie.

Turns out “Smooth,” according to Portland Press Herald State House reporter Steve Mistler, is one Dionhaywood “Smooth” Blackwell, 31, of New Haven, Connecticut. He was arrested in Bangor on Sept. 11 and charged with felony drug trafficking. The other names the governor mentioned were, wrote Mistler, “presumably fictitious.”

Now, let’s make no mistake about it: Maine, like the rest of New England, has a serious heroin epidemic on its hands. The question before the legislative committee last week was what to do about it.

LePage would have us believe that it’s a supply-side issue: Cut off the flow of heroin coming into Maine and, just like that, the problem goes away.

Except it doesn’t.

If he learned one thing while earning his MBA at the University of Maine all those years ago, you’d think LePage would grasp the inextricable relationship between supply and demand.

Advertisement

In this case, demand comes from the thousands of Mainers now tragically addicted to cheap, readily available heroin. They couldn’t care less whether it comes from “Smooth” or “Shifty” or, once those lowlifes have been thrown in the slammer, whoever is recruited overnight to replace them and keep the drugs flowing north.

Yet LePage, in his zeal to now turn Maine’s war on drugs into an actual military operation, brings nothing to the table when it comes to helping addicted Mainers – his constituents – rid themselves of the scourge that heroin has become in recent years.

While the death toll from heroin overdoses rises alarmingly in urban and rural areas alike, funding for addiction treatment and prevention plummets.

While LePage quite accurately predicts that we will see more dead people in the months and years ahead, he deludes himself into thinking that as commander in chief he can simply make it all go away – this time with soldiers.

While smart people in and out of state government grapple with the complexities of Maine’s drug dilemma, LePage once again elbows his way to the front of the room, the quintessential man without a plan, brimming with names he just made up and threats he cannot fulfill.

If only, rather than waste lawmakers’ time on Thursday, LePage had taken a ride down to Scarborough.

Advertisement

There, he could have learned more about the Scarborough Police Department’s 2-month-old “Operation Hope” – proof positive that effective law enforcement means more than just rounding up the bad guys and tossing them in jail.

The program couldn’t be more simple: If you’re addicted to heroin and reached the end of your rope, you knock on the door of the Scarborough Police Department and simply ask for help. You can even surrender your drugs and paraphernalia on the spot, no questions asked.

From there, an officer and a recovery volunteer will steer you toward help ranging from short-term detox to a 30-day treatment program. So far, 39 addicts have received long-term treatment in six different states, many by way of donated “scholarship” beds because they lack the insurance or other funds to pay for it.

“Enforcement alone isn’t going to resolve this (heroin) issue,” said Officer John Gill, who spearheads the program with the full blessing of Police Chief Robbie Moulton.

“We’re not arresting our way out of this. By addressing the treatment portion and getting people into treatment programs to get well, that’s going to reduce demand.”

Operation Hope, modeled after a program in Gloucester, Massachusetts, has drawn addicts from Lebanon to as far north as Garland. Gill has no doubt that if other police departments in Maine were to start opening their doors to addicts, they’d get the same response.

Advertisement

“The biggest factor is shame,” he said. “They are ashamed of what they have become. For them to walk into a police station and ask for help, they’ve hit rock bottom.”

Operation Hope’s biggest challenge, of course, is sustainability – it receives nary a nickel of taxpayer support. While you’re more than welcome to log onto www.operationhopemaine.org and make a donation to help defray travel costs for an addict traveling out of state for treatment (there simply aren’t enough beds in Maine), the simple truth is that we as a state are dropping the ball here.

So perhaps this is a good time to ask ourselves: Do we really want to be known as the state where the good men and women of the National Guard move out with mugshots of “AK,” “PK,” “Scummy” and “Shifty” taped to their dashboards?

Or might we better fight this battle first and foremost by taking care of our own – before they become just another statistic?

Put another way, if not for Operation Hope, where would those 39 addicts be today?

Noted Gill, “At least they’ll have an opportunity to stay alive.”

 


Only subscribers are eligible to post comments. Please subscribe or login first for digital access. Here’s why.

Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.