
A discarded needle found near Cumberland Street in September. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer
The Portland City Council is scheduled to vote Monday night on two diverging proposals to address needle litter around the city.
One, proposed by Mayor Mark Dion, would lower the rate at which the city can hand out clean needles for every used one that’s turned in. Another, brought by Councilor April Fournier on behalf of city staff, would use opioid settlement money to fund a pilot version of a needle buy-back program for one year, in which people who return dirty needles can get cash.
Councilors Anna Bullett, Regina Phillips, Kate Sykes and Anna Trevorrow all said they would oppose Dion’s proposal to return to a one-to-one exchange rate and instead would support the buy-back program.
“The whole purpose of this is to get the needles off the street and help the folks that are in need. That’s an improvement we can implement to see if it works. I’m very in favor of that,” Phillips said.
Fournier did not answer questions about how she plans to vote but said in an email that she looks forward to hearing public comment on Monday night. Other councilors did not respond to questions about the proposal on Friday.
Dion wrote in an op-ed published in the Portland Press Herald last month that he thinks the current program, in which people can get up to 100 clean needles for every dirty one they return to the city, is dangerous.
“Any one injection can be fatal. The harm of an overdose death is irrevocable,” wrote Dion. “Despite our ability to prevent death with Narcan, we must reconsider a policy that provides 100 needles for second, third and multiple other chances for addicts to taunt the finality of their own lives.”
He went on to write that the “undeniable tide” of discarded needles in Portland is hurting business owners and residents.
REDUCING NEEDLE LITTER
The city has run a needle exchange program since 1998, giving clean syringes to anyone who returns used ones for safe disposal. It’s a harm-reduction tactic that is proven to mitigate the spread of diseases like Hepatitis C and HIV because people are less likely to reuse or share needles.
For decades, Portland had a one-for-one exchange policy in accordance with state law. That meant someone could only get as many clean syringes as used ones they turned in. The governor temporarily loosened those restrictions during the pandemic, but Portland was one of the final cities to opt-in. The state law changed permanently in 2022, allowing needle exchange programs to give out as many as 100 clean needles at a time.
According to data provided by the city, the program handed out 786,000 clean syringes to 2,329 people between Nov. 1, 2022, and Oct. 31, 2023, a rate of less than one needle per person per day. The city collected 537,000 discarded syringes in that time period.
Bullet said she is concerned that lowering the exchange rate could lead to increased incidences of HIV and Hepatitis C infection, but she’s also worried about regular infections. She thinks it could overwhelm emergency rooms in the city and create worse public health outcomes.
Phillips said she’d like to see the city try other solutions to solve the needle litter first.
“The program is working right now. We need to improve it, maybe with more sharps containers and more cleanup crews. But let’s do that first and if it’s not enough, we can come back and consider something like this in six months.”
Trevorrow said she thinks Dion’s proposal would do more harm than good and move the city in the wrong direction.
“It’s reactionary and I don’t think it will have any effect on reducing the number of needles on the streets, I think it would have more of an effect of increasing disease in the public,” said Trevorrow.
Sykes called Dion’s idea “a reckless gamble with public health” and said she’d like to see solutions that don’t punish those struggling with addiction.
“Fear mongering about needle waste stigmatizes the most vulnerable people in our community,” she said.
NEEDLE BUY-BACK PROGRAM
The proposed needle buy-back program would not change the way the city’s existing needle exchange program operates. Instead, it would be an entirely separate program intended to incentivize people to dispose of used needles properly rather than leaving them on the street.
The new program, if approved by the Council, is estimated to cost $52,000 per year, which would be paid for with opioid settlement funds.
Fournier, who chairs the Council’s Health and Human Services and Public Safety Committee, wrote in an email Friday that coming up with the proposal took months of discussion and that community partners and city public health staff were instrumental in crafting the resolution.
Many councilors see this plan as a better approach.
“It’s a much more proactive method of taking back the needles that are out there in the community,” said Trevorrow.
“We’ve got to try lots of different things to help right this wrong, so I definitely support this effort but I will be following closely to see what results it produces,” said Bullett.
Phillips said this is exactly the type of improvement she’d like to see to the program before doing something most drastic like limiting the exchange rate.
Sykes agreed that the buy-back program proposal is the direction she’d like to see the city go when it comes to addressing needle waste.
“That’s the kind of evidence-based measure that’s not punitive that we should be embracing,” she said. “I think it would work here and I think it’s what we should do.”
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