The Bulletin., November 13, 2022, Page 8, Image 8

A8 THE BULLETIN • SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2022
Policy
Continued from A1
When spent 27 days in the De-
schutes County Jail for a probation
violation earlier this fall something
was different. For one thing, the come-
down from fentanyl was “horrendous.”
It was almost impossible to eat or sleep
for the first 10 days, he said.
In the midst of those sleepless
nights, Bergstad-Kissinger saw how
addiction was treating an old acquain-
tance — and began to understand how
addiction was treating himself.
“Just how he carried himself and
how he was about everything just
disgusted me — that I was just like
that,” Bergstad-Kissinger said, de-
scribing tossing and turning all night
after that. “I promised myself. ‘I’m
not gonna get out and ... do dope.
And so the next day I (called) my
probation officer and I said, ‘Look, I
need help.’”
So this time, when he got out of jail,
not only was Bergstad-Kissinger ready
for recovery — but the resources to
make that happen were also ready for
him. Working with providers and peer
mentors who regularly visited the jail,
he had medical appointments lined up
for the day he got out. He’s now on Su-
boxone, a daily drug used to treat opi-
oid addiction, and has a spot at a sober
living home.
When Oregon voters approved
Measure 110 in 2020 to decriminal-
ize hard drugs in the state, they were
promised a less punitive system of
shepherding Bergstad-Kissinger and
countless others like him into a wider
range of treatment options than the
50-year war on drugs. But two years
later, the state remains deeply divided
about what to do about a policy roll-
out that has yet to quite live up to
those promises.
Decriminalization,
overdoses and crime
Oregon has seen skyrocketing
rates of overdose deaths in recent
years, with overdoses or poisoning
becoming 2020’s most common form
of injury-related death in the state.
But while some political critics
of Measure 110 use the rising death
rates as evidence of the initiative’s
failure, others aren’t so quick to draw
that conclusion. Oregon’s increas-
ing overdose deaths have been in-
fluenced by a number of things, like
the economic and social breakdown
from COVID-19 and the nationwide
spread of fentanyl appearing in Or-
egon’s drug supply, according to Dr.
Todd Korthuis, head of addiction
medicine at Oregon Health & Sci-
ence University.
“The essential truth is that the
trends we’re seeing preceded Measure
110, and are eclipsing Measure 110,”
Korthuis said, while noting that the
ballot measure has reduced the num-
ber of people accessing treatment
through the criminal justice system.
“I’m very suspicious of statements like
‘You know Measure 110 increased
drug use.’ No, fentanyl increased drug
use. And Measure 110 — and the rest
of us — are still grappling with how to
address the fentanyl issue.”
The question of whether or not
drug decriminalization is causing in-
creases in addiction, drug overdoses
and crime is a fraught one, and it’s
one experts don’t agree on.
For one thing, data on the topic
can take years to shift in response to
policy changes. But the data that is
available shows one promise of the
ballot measure is coming to fruition:
Fewer people are getting arrested for
drug possession. Police made more
than 6,700 arrests where possession
was the most serious charge in 2019,
before decriminalization, according
to state data. Since decriminalization
took effect in Feb. 2021, police have
issued just under 3,500 tickets for
drug possession.
About 80% of those tickets re-
sulted in convictions, many for a de-
fendant’s failure to appear. Only 8%
were dismissed, which occurs under
the new law when an individual calls
a state-run hotline for a drug addic-
tion screening.
Locally, a spokesperson for the De-
schutes County Sheriff’s office was
hesitant to directly link perceived in-
creases in crime or homelessness to
the passage of Measure 110 but said
the decriminalization of hard drugs
has led to fewer drug arrests. In 2019,
deputies responded to 262 drug-re-
lated calls for service and made 400-
drug related arrests. In 2021, the
year drugs were decriminalized in
Oregon, deputies responded to 224
drug-related calls and 127 arrests.
Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz
said there isn’t yet hard evidence to
prove the connection, but that what
the department has seen suggests
that decriminalization is contributing
to increased overdoses.
“That’s a really challenging posi-
tion to be in and trying to offer treat-
ment to folks who have really given
up everything in their life to fuel their
addiction. The only thing they have
left is their freedom and that’s where
Nurse Practi-
tioner Diana
Everly, left,
meets with
Bradley Berg-
stad-Kissinger
at Ideal Op-
tion in Bend
last week.
Dean Guernsey/
The Bulletin
I think, previously, there was some
impact by really having the ability to,
as an option, force treatment because
of criminal actions,” Krantz said. “At
some level, there was an opportunity
there to intervene, and that opportu-
nity is lost.”
Krantz also said that, because writ-
ing tickets for drug possession has
become less of a priority for the de-
partment, investigating some crimes
has become more challenging for po-
lice, who used to be able to use drug
arrests and searches as a way to locate
evidence for other crimes.
Oregon’s decriminalization hasn’t
been rolled out the right way, accord-
ing to Keith Humphreys, director of
the Stanford Network on Addiction
Policy. He was among a panel of ex-
perts who testified to the legislature
earlier this year. Humphreys said a
plan without any law enforcement
wasn’t going to work, given that peo-
ple often need external societal pres-
sure to make the choice to get help.
“What we see is kind of under-
standable, there’s very little pressure,
and it feels good (to keep using),”
Humphreys told The Bulletin. “A lot
of people will keep going.”
He points instead to models in Eu-
ropean cities where, though drugs are
decriminalized, law enforcement is
still involved in diverting people who
commit non-drug crimes while us-
ing drugs and in organized, high-level
crackdowns on open-air drug dealing.
Peer mentors: The ‘secret sauce’?
For Shawnda Jennings, the work of
peer outreach is deeply personal. She
lived with addiction for decades, and
now works for Ideal Option, which
can prescribe hard-to-get addiction
treatment medication, meeting peo-
ple with addiction in the Deschutes
County Jail and across the region to
get them connected to treatment ser-
vices, often within a day.
Jennings said she saw a “light come
on” inside herself while working her
first peer support job at the Cascades
Peer and Self Help Center in Bend,
and she’s continued to feel that in
her new, Measure 110-funded job at
Ideal Option.
“That’s my story, and I feel like I
came full circle for a reason,” Jen-
nings said. “I feel like it helps me, in
my soul, my purpose.”
Jennings was the person
who helped get Bradley Bergs-
tad-Kissinger an Ideal Option ap-
pointment about an hour after his
release from jail.
Experts say having immediate ac-
cess to treatment is critical to suc-
cessful treatment. Someone might
be ready to stop using drugs one
moment, but no longer interested
when they get off a treatment center
waitlist two weeks later, according to
Tera Hurst, executive director of the
Health Justice Recovery Alliance, a
nonprofit that’s supporting the roll-
out of Measure 110.
“The reality is, on the ground, we
have not been able to meet people
when they’re ready for treatment.
We put them on waitlists, whether
they’re two weeks, 10 weeks, a couple
of months, we asked folks to just hold
on,” Hurst said. “We know that you
need to have services available the
minute somebody’s ready, and in Or-
egon we have not had that.”
Another key is the inclusion of
lived experience in a person’s treat-
ment and support. Peer mentors are
the “secret sauce” to a successful re-
covery strategy, multiple advocates
have told The Bulletin in interviews.
“It’s that lived experience, that’s
what peer support is and what makes
it key, so individuals can relate,” Jen-
nings said.
One goal of Measure 110 was to
lean into the importance of imme-
diate access and peer mentorship in
supporting recovery. Both were ar-
eas of focus for most of the 233 or-
ganizations across the state receiving
some of the $265 million in mari-
juana taxes redirected for addiction
services.
A major flaw in that plan, though,
has been timing.
Oregon decriminalized drugs before
it expanded drug services
Bureaucratic bungling has had an
outsized impact on perceptions of
Measure 110’s success: Drug decrimi-
nalization took place on Feb. 1, 2021,
funding for the treatment services
that measure supporters promised
would make up for criminal penalties
wasn’t finally approved by the council
until September of this year.
The funding is distributed and
overseen by a statewide Oversight
and Accountability Council estab-
lished by the original ballot measure.
The 18-member board is made up of
volunteers, most of whom are treat-
ment providers, community advo-
cates and medical experts.
A lack of support for those volun-
teers proved problematic in the first
months of the council’s attempts to
implement and fund Measure 110
services. A year and a half into the
board’s existence, its meetings are
still a mix of major financial deci-
sions, like which providers should get
millions, and basic operational deci-
sions, like who should read and re-
spond to emails the board received.
Health authority officials admit-
ted mistakes to state legislators over
the summer, noting that the agency
hadn’t provided sufficient staffing to
the council for the complexity of the
grant making process. The health au-
thority would not make agency staff
or members of the council available
for an interview, but said in a state-
ment there was “a lot of learning”
early in the process which was also
hampered by the pandemic.
“The increased staffing, improved
processes and reporting structure
we have in place will enable us to
move quickly to troubleshoot issues
as they arise,” Tim Heider, an OHA
spokesperson, wrote in response to
emailed questions. “We are commit-
ted to working closely with the OAC
to ensure that people seeking help for
their drug use get needed services.”
But for Bergstad-Kissinger, recov-
ery isn’t about bureaucracy, funding
or what politicians and experts have to
say about public policy. It’s about find-
ing what makes him want to change.
“ So I know the tools, I just never
applied them. I just never you know,
put two and two together and really
try,” he said. “This is me at full capac-
ity, 110% effort into this.”
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Reporter: 541-617-7814,
zdemars@bendbulletin.com