Yukon NDP Leader Kate White is frustrated that the Yukon’s managed alcohol program still hasn’t opened while hopeful clients keep waiting for what she deems a “critical health-care service.”
Although the Yukon government missed its confidence-and-supply agreement deadline on the file, White isn't considering walking away from the deal with the Liberals yet, like the NDP recently did at the federal level.
"I still have a lot more balls in the air," she said.
The managed alcohol program is intended to eventually house up to 10 individuals struggling with severe alcohol use disorder out of the former St. Elias Adult Group Home on Hoge Street in downtown Whitehorse.
According to a January 2024 Yukon government press release, the first program intake had been scheduled for this spring but never materialized.
The Yukon Party raised questions about the status of the managed alcohol program in a recent press release.
Health critic Brad Cathers, who is the Yukon Party MLA for Lake Laberge, told the News by phone Sept. 13 his party heard from reliable sources that the facility remains empty.
The Official Opposition criticized the original decision to move group home residents out.
“That facility was purpose built for adults with cognitive disabilities, and we continue to disagree with the decision to move them from that facility designed to meet their needs, out into facilities that were not designed to meet their needs,” Cathers said.
Establishing a managed alcohol program within a year is a pledge in the second iteration of the confidence-and-supply agreement, known as CASA, signed between the Yukon Liberal Party and Yukon NDP caucuses on Jan. 31, 2023. A managed alcohol program is a component of the substance use health emergency plan released in August 2023. The territory declared a Yukon-wide emergency in January 2022.
“They (the governing Liberals) were scrambling to fulfill a CASA commitment with the NDP to establish a managed alcohol program by a deadline, and it put the political optics of the situation ahead of the needs of the people who are living in that facility,” Cathers said.
This past winter, the ex-group home residents were split up and moved out into two smaller group homes. Cathers said the move happened without consulting the people affected by it. The health department justified the move in that it’s “consistent with what’s happening” with adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities across Canada as institutions are closing in favour of community-based housing.
While the group home apparently wasn't appropriate for the former group home residents, given it’s “still very much like an institution,” White said it’s a more suitable place for the managed alcohol program.
“I'm just waiting for what I think is a dignified response to substance use, and that is the managed alcohol program,” she told the News by phone on Sept. 16.
In a Sept. 16 phone interview, Cameron Grandy, the Yukon’s director of substance use, said the Department of Health and Social Services is in the final stages of hiring staff to get them started in two weeks.
Grandy indicated the idea is for the facility to start intake in October, but that depends on getting the already-delayed human resources and administrative components in place.
The previous group home residents were relocated earlier this year because their new homes to which they were moving were ready to provide their care, Grandy explained.
White said she’s not surprised that the Yukon Party is pushing on this CASA commitment right now.
“The Yukon NDP were pushing for this when they (the Yukon Party) were a government. You know, they told us that it was unimportant and not required,” White said.
“Ultimately, I'm trying to get things done for Yukoners, and I believe that a managed alcohol program is harm reduction, and I believe that it's like critical, and I believe that it's a way to allow people to have dignity.”
Cathers said his party hasn’t been given details on exactly what the program will entail.
He wonders if the program and the government’s vision for it will be the best solution.
“We had questions about whether it will be effective or not, recognizing that there are different models for managed alcohol programs that have been tried across the country,” Cathers said.
“We would evaluate any program that's intended to help people break free of an addiction or reduce their dependency on how well it actually works.”
More than 40 managed alcohol programs were already running throughout Canada as of February 2022, according to the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research.
As previously reported by the News, the Yukon’s proposed program will deliver medically prescribed doses of alcohol in beverage form at regular intervals to up to 10 live-in clients, under supervision. There’s no maximum length of stay. Indicators of success, which were still being determined, include reduced contact with RCMP, less arrests, fewer drop-offs at the hospital and the arrest processing unit at the Whitehorse Correctional Centre, and a lower number of admissions to detox.
“These are people who live with severe, what we would call ‘treatment resistant,’ alcohol use disorder,” Grandy said.
The incoming program will offer social support and alcohol in a managed way, as part of a client's medication, which helps them stabilize, per Grandy.
“It helps keep them from over-abusing alcohol, but also prevents the negative effects from going into withdrawal for someone whose body is physically dependent on the substance. So, it really operates like an assisted-living or a group-home model with alcohol as part of the therapy,” Grandy said.
Contact Dana Hatherly at dana.hatherly@yukon-news.com
