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There was a fascinating story on Morning Edition today about a harm reduction program in King County, Washington. A lot of good things have come out of King County--you might recall the County Bar Association's resolution calling for a reevaluation of the war on drugs last year--but I hadn't heard anything about this one.

Last winter, a government facility was established that could house 75 of the county's chronically homeless people with severe alcohol abuse problems. People were invited to move into the facility based on the extreme fiscal strain they were placing on the county for things like paramedic visits, emergency room visits and jail time.

The thing that's remarkable about this program is that it allows residents to continue to drink, even in the facility. Bill Hobson, the homeless advocate who runs the program, talked a bit about its controversial nature, and the county's perspective:

Very bright people still can't get over an alcoholic who can't stop drinking or won't stop drinking. What we're doing is acknowledging that the likelihood is that they're never going to stop drinking. What we want to do is to help them discover ways to reduce the levels of consumption, around a bunch of people that actually care about them, and reduce their utilization of these other expensive services.

It's exciting to see a government putting realism and compassion ahead of ideology. Hobson says, "Political leadership in Seattle and King County challenged the community to come up with another way of looking at this--another way of dealing with this problem."

It's awesome to see the changes that can take place on the local level.

Posted by Megan Farrington.
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