VANCOUVER: Opioid crisis takes toll on Portland Hotel Society staff
OVERTAXED: Portland Hotel Society boss says staff dealing with ‘two, three, four’ overdoses per shift
A rite of passage for a lot of folk who begin work at the Portland Hotel Society is being asked what tattoos they have and what band they were in.
Jennifer Breakspear wasn’t asked either when she took over as executive director of the Vancouver Downtown Eastside agency a month ago, but if you’re wondering, no, she’s not been in a band, but she is on a long-term quest to master the bass guitar.
And, yes, the new executive director PHS of has a tattoo — a pride flag with a pink triangle in the middle on one shoulder.
“It’s been a 90-degree learning curve,” Breakspear said of her new job, sitting in her second-floor office on the 100-block East Hastings. “Working with this amazing team ... I think I’d feel pretty frustrated to be on the outside in the midst of this (opioid) crisis, not being able to contribute in some way.
“So being able to support this team and the work they’re doing, selfishly that allows me to feel like I’m doing some good in this difficult time for this community.”
It’s been well publicized how the founding co-executive directors were forced to resign after a provincial audit in 2014, how two more executive directors came and went, one after 14 months, the other after eight months, and how the position sat unfilled for another eight months until Breakspear took the reins on Jan. 16.
To the staff’s credit, Breakspear said, they didn’t miss a beat during the tumult.
Portland Hotel Society’s primary responsibilities are co-managing Insite and Onsite with Coastal Health, and looking after upwards of 1,000 rooms in supportive housing.
The society is about 70 per cent funded by government, mostly through Vancouver Coastal Health and B.C. Housing. Getting private donors more involved is one of Breakspear’s goals.
“When I’ve been asked whether I’m going to try to find new funding, the answer is an enthusiastic yes,” she said. “There’s no reason this organization shouldn’t be receiving, shouldn’t be attracting, private donations from people who care about the mission of this organization.”
Breakspear is an Ottawa native, as is her partner Laurie Anderson.
They met 21 years ago at a planning meeting for the national women’s march against poverty.
“The first meeting I walked into, my bike had been stolen,” she recalled. “I was late to the meeting because my bike was gone and ‘aaarrgggghhhh!’ I walk in, there’s this woman’s back to me as I come in the door, I go around the table to where there’s an empty chair.
“This woman had her head down, she was writing in a notebook, then she looked up and flashed this beautiful smile at me and ‘whoa!’ “The day got better.” The couple married in 2005. Besides sundry volunteer assignments over the years with Amnesty International, Canadian Blood Services, Zee Zee Theatre and other organizations, Breakspear’s last two gigs were executive director at Options for Sexual Health for five years, and at Qmunity, a West End LGBT group that endeavours to improve the lives of trans and queers.
She’s worried about the overtaxed staff at PHS, worried about the incredibly emotional ups and downs as they respond to two, three, four overdoses a shift.
PHS staff are often the immediate help on the scene, before paramedics or fire rescue help arrive, the first first-responders, so to speak.
“They’re bringing people back, the people they’re reviving are people they care about,” Breakspear, a one-time paramedic herself, said. “They’re reviving people, but there is also a lot of loss, people they’ve known for years. “They can’t sustain this pace. “We need to know we’ll have continued support (after the end of the fiscal year March 31) from all levels of government.”