Cash sought to ferry inmates to treatment centres
The Victoria Dandelion Society needs about $10,000 to continue to transport inmates directly from jail to drug treatment centres on the Lower Mainland.
Last week, Rev. Al Tysick announced the society was ending its inmate-transportation program because it can no longer afford costs of about $730 a day to drive an inmate from the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre to a treatment centre.
“I think that’s cheap when you think it may save a life, but no one is willing to pay our cost,” said Tysick, who founded the Dandelion Society in 2011 to support people living on the street, in shelters or in jail.
The transportation program started about 14 months ago and has helped about 21 inmates, who have all graduated from treatment programs, Tysick said.
“It grew out of a need,” said defence lawyer and former board member Tom Morino. “There are a lot of guys in custody here. They’re in. They’re drug addicts. They apply to a treatment centre and they get accepted. But the court is reluctant to release inmates on to the street to make their own way to the treatment centre. We all know what happens — ‘One more hit before I go’ — and then it’s too late. They are off and gone.”
In the past, lawyers had been driving their clients to the ferry, but the clients never arrived at the treatment centres, Tysick said. When he found out judges were willing to release inmates into the care of an agent who would bring them directly to a treatment centre, he decided to be the go-between.
“We’d pick them up at 7 a.m. at the jail and try and catch the 9 a.m. ferry. My staff would talk to them and encourage them and buy them breakfast on the ferry. If they decided to walk off, they could. But they never did. Not one person,” Tysick said. “We brought them to the treatment centre and they all stayed.”
The success of the program has, in many ways, killed it, Tysick said. More and more lawyers from Victoria and Duncan have called to ask the society to transport their clients. Originally, the Dandelion Society was transporting one inmate a month. That increased to about two a month. More recently, staff were transporting an inmate every week.
The estimated cost of $730 includes paying two staff members for about 12 hours to accompany the inmate, a return trip on a ferry and meals.
The Dandelion Society is still willing to be involved, donating staff time and the vehicle, if someone comes up with the money, Tysick said.
Morino has had several clients released from jail who have gone to treatment and stayed clean.
The defence lawyer is concerned about lengthy jail sentences being handed out to people convicted of trafficking street drugs containing fentanyl.
“That’s why a program like Rev. Al’s is absolutely critical. If people go and take treatment and do well, the courts might look favourably upon that and perhaps not give these lengthy jail sentences,” said Morino. “It’s nickels and dimes compared to the cost of locking people up for extended periods of time. And it’s humane.”
Galvin Young, the intake administrator at VisionQuest Recovery Society, said inmates from Victoria receive a lot of support from judges, lawyers and the Crown.
“It’s been awesome with the Dandelion Society,” Young said. “It’s amazing. They deliver them here personally, and they’re in good spirits and prepared. It’s a lot more helpful.”