OPINION
4A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, AUGUST 14, 2017
Founded in 1873
DAVID F. PERO, Publisher & Editor
JEREMY FELDMAN, Circulation Manager
DEBRA BLOOM, Business Manager
JOHN D. BRUIJN, Production Manager
CARL EARL, Systems Manager
OUR VIEW
Needle exchange
program is sensible
A
lthough it’s depressing to consider that we live in a
time when opioid drug addiction is a familiar aspect of
American life even in bucolic rural areas like ours, we
can derive some encouragement from the fact Clatsop County
commissioners and other public officials are receptive to creat-
ing a needle exchange program.
Regret about an ugly situation shouldn’t get in the way of
confronting it with every tool at our disposal.
The county’s ability to take this sensible action was much
aided by a $50,000 donation from Friends of Columbia
Community Health; all communities should be so lucky as to
have such a nonprofit.
Although needle use here around the mouth of the Columbia
is still tied in part to illicit use of methamphetamine, there’s
no doubt use of heroin and related opioid drugs has become
entrenched in our towns — places where heroin was an alien
concept merely 10 or 15 years ago.
Nationwide, deaths involving the use of the pain-relieving
drugs have quadrupled since 1999, according to the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC found the amount
of painkillers prescribed during the year was enough for every
American to be medicated around the clock for three weeks.
While the spread of illicit forms of opioid drugs has a complex
set of causes, many public health experts believe over-prescrib-
ing of pain drugs has created physical dependencies in people, a
few of whom then turn to cheaper heroin.
Nationwide, opioids were involved in 33,091 fatal overdoses
in 2015. Preliminary figures suggest a shocking increase to
around 60,000 deaths in 2016. There are up to 2.6 million opi-
oid addicts in the U.S. A federal report issued last week stated,
“The opioid epidemic we are facing is unparalleled. The aver-
age American would likely be shocked to know that drug over-
doses now kill more people than gun homicides and car crashes
combined.” This danger has been much increased in the past
couple years by the addition of powerful synthetic pain drugs to
up the strength of street heroin.
The momentum of this health disaster swept up President
Donald Trump this past week, who declaimed: “The opioid cri-
sis is an emergency, and I’m saying officially right now it is
an emergency. It’s a national emergency. We’re going to spend
a lot of time, a lot of effort and a lot of money on the opioid
crisis.”
An emergency declaration will be beneficial, allowing offi-
cials at all levels to bypass some aspects of bureaucratic red
tape that otherwise impedes sensible responses like the one in
Clatsop County. Funds freed up by a presidential declaration
should go toward addiction treatment and other forms of pub-
lic-health intervention, and not be used to ramp up yet another
failed “war on drugs” that sends addicts to prison. “We’re not
going to arrest our way
out of this epidemic,” a
co-director of the Johns
Exchanges are a
Hopkins Center for Drug
compassionate
Safety and Effectiveness
way to stem the
told the Washington Post.
Emergency respond-
spread of blood-
ers in our region have
borne diseases,
become increasingly
used to the need to carry
while building
and administer the new
points of contact
fast-acting opiate-antidote
naloxone. Administration
between addicts
of the antidote has
and health
become almost standard
providers.
operating procedure in
some circumstances, such
as when the patient is
unresponsive or there are other clues they may have overdosed.
The actual antidote is inexpensive, but patented delivery sys-
tems make doses shockingly expensive. Congress and the pres-
ident could make themselves useful by forcefully intervening in
this situation that puts profits ahead of lives.
Steps like the needle exchange program stir some natural
concerns in the law enforcement community. Such exchanges
are a compassionate way to stem the spread of blood-borne dis-
eases, while building points of contact between addicts and
health providers that can help lead to recovery and overdose
avoidance. But, clearly, compassion should be tempered by the
need to avoid creating an attractive nuisance that draws more
criminal behavior to particular neighborhoods or communities.
Enlightened policies can’t be permitted to become a slippery
slope to “anything goes.”
Law enforcement and prosecutors will best spend their time
by pursuing major dealers and distribution networks.
There’s no doubt that heroin and its prescription-drug sib-
lings are exacting a terrible toll on our communities. Every pre-
mature death and life squandered in addiction is deeply regret-
table. Society’s heroin junkie is someone’s son, daughter,
mother, father, brother, sister.
This is a crisis worthy of everyone’s attention.
SOUTHERN EXPOSURE
An interview with the chief
By R.J. MARX
The Daily Astorian
C
annon Beach Police Chief
Jason Schermerhorn is a
model of community law
enforcement. A for-
mer Seaside Police
officer, Scher-
merhorn was
selected as Can-
non Beach chief in
2012 out of a field
of 40 candidates.
His involvement with citizens and
the community — be it as emer-
gency preparedness leader, volun-
teer firefighter, Rotary member, par-
ticipant in “Shop with a Cop” and
“National Night Out” or mentor for
youth — is visible. He is vocal and
available for residents as a go-to for
those in need.
His latest role is an interim one,
filling in for former City Manager
Brant Kucera, who left to take a
similar job in the city of Sisters. We
caught up with Schermerhorn at
his office at police headquarters.
Q: So much is going on with
you in this dual role of police chief
and city manager. Is it doable?
A: It is doable. The great thing
with Cannon Beach is that we have
great employees. In the last three
weeks, there have been times when
each of the department heads have
been gone and their crews just pick
up after them and do what they
need to do.
Of course I am biased, but it is
great for me to step away from the
police department and have every-
thing still going smoothly here.
Everybody down the line does a
great job.
Q: What are the big issues you
are addressing?
A: As city manager, we have
a new building official. The char-
ter school is the big thing now. We
are working with the academy on
building permits. There are a lot
of things that keep popping up.
They’re on a time crunch to get
ready.
Q: Do you see timed parking as
inevitable here?
A: I don’t know. It was all
based on the survey for the strate-
gic plan, and that was one of the
solutions that came up. It never
hurts to try something, but the hard
thing with that was, it was a rush.
That upset the citizenry as well as
the business owners because they
said, “We want some involvement
in this.” That’s always important.
Q: In the past years I have seen
you go through some extraordinary
tragedies. The killing of a 2-year-
old and attack on her 13-year-old
sister, Alana, by Jessica Smith in
2014; and the death of your friend,
Seaside Police Sgt. Jason Good-
ding, shot by Phillip Max Ferry
in February 2016. You have been
through more in three years than
most cops go through in a lifetime.
Talk to me about that.
A: You are right. It has been
a career of dealing with different
tragedies. The last three years have
been very extreme. That’s where it
falls down on your co-workers, and
your family and your friends, being
able to have that and separating
yourself from the events. I think
dealing with the homicide and
Alana was very difficult for me,
because the children were around
my kids’ ages. You personalize that
and put yourself in that situation.
Q: How did you cope?
A: … Cannon Beach is such a
great town in dealing with those
things.
We got so much assistance from
our citizens here and our coun-
cil. Our different department heads
The Daily Astorian/File Photo
Police Chief Jason Schermerhorn serves up burgers at “Burger with
a Cop” in June 2015. With him are family members Jennifer, Jackson
and Jasmine Schermerhorn.
R.J. Marx/The Daily Astorian
Chief Jason Schermerhorn at his
office in police headquarters.
were very helpful and gracious in
working with us. That was great.
But also working with the other
agencies, when you’re looking at
that homicide and Jason’s homi-
cide, the amount of support was
amazing. That was a great resource
for us. It’s really something.
I think about Jason every day.
Just quirks and things that he does
and his daughter J.J. — Jayden is
my daughter’s best friend. She is
my daughter’s age, and she is the
spitting image of her dad.
Jason was my first recruit in
Seaside. When he first came in he
was assigned to me first. We were
very close. We helped them move
down into town. Our kids have
grown up together and my wife and
Amy (Goodding) have been very
close.
All those memories were good
memories. And what a great offi-
cer he was.
Those are the things that I think
about, the positive things.
Q: Has it affected the way you
approach your duties?
A: Absolutely. You always have
that police paranoia when you
are dealing with different things,
whether it’s a traffic stop or other
things. You get those situations
where the hair kind of jumps up on
the back of your neck.
Phil Ferry was somebody I had
dealt with many, many times when
I was in Seaside and on the drug
task force where we had fought
with him and he didn’t have a gun.
He had physically fought with
us and resisted arrest, but we had
not contacted him with a firearm
before. That just shows you how
easily available weapons are for
people.
Q: I know in a very general
sense there is a concern about
crime in rural parts of our county.
A: There are certainly locals
distributing drugs and using drugs.
When I was on the drug task force,
we had the highest amount of drugs
per capita in the state of Oregon,
based on our county and the popu-
lation. So much of it is going back
and forth from rural areas.
You also have Highway 101
which stretches from Canada to
Mexico. People do not want to go
the I-5 route because they know
there is more law enforcement
out there, bigger agencies. They
think they can take this back high-
way here and they’ll be free. That’s
what’s great about having (Gunner)
the canine here. We’ve had that 3
1/2, four years. He is a great tool to
have out there.
Q: What would you say is the
police department’s biggest need
right now?
A: That is a good question.
Right now we are trying to fill one
of our positions. We lost (Sgt.) Josh
(Gregory) to Seaside. Filling that
position is probably our biggest
need, just for manpower. It’s hard
on officers. They’re working lon-
ger hours. They’re covering shifts.
That’s what’s harder with me split-
ting both roles. It takes me out of
the equation. I’ll cover when I can,
but it doesn’t open me up to work-
ing a whole lot of extra hours.
Q: The city of Cannon Beach
has a reputation of being far ahead
of many other cities for tsunami
and emergency preparedness.
A: We have a great CERT
(Community Emergency Response
Team) program. We have 42 CERT
members now and 21 Medical
Reserve Corps members and we’ve
recently added Red Cross in the last
six months. We’re moving forward
in building shelters.
It’s really good. But we still
have a lot of work to do. A lot of
that will be our South Wind project,
of adding a shelter down there and
getting funding for it. That is some-
thing our emergency management
consultant Stacy (Burr) is working
on and will be bringing to the coun-
cil in the next few months to get us
started so we can get federal fund-
ing. We need to have a shelter up
there so we can begin getting grant
money.
Q: How can the community pro-
vide you with what you need to do
your job better?
A: Just showing support.
They’ve done that. They’ve gone
above and beyond. I think we’re
going to do another round to raise
money for the canine. Those are
ways they can show it. Also by
thanking the officers when they see
them and helping out when they
can.
R.J. Marx is The Daily Astorian’s
South County reporter and editor
of the Seaside Signal and Cannon
Beach Gazette.