Today’s letters: Drug use is making Centretown less and less safe

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I have lived in Centretown for 27 years. It was never a place where open drug use and the detritus that comes with it was commonplace, until the pandemic. I have never seen anything like the drug debris and open drug use that has become part of the landscape in the last four years.

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It is truly sad and it is destroying this neighbourhood as a place for everyone. I find needles, pipes and all manner of drug debris on a regular basis. I watch people smoking fentanyl in the middle of the day on Bank Street, and small-time dealers selling to addicts at Bank and Gilmour Streets.

For the first time, I have decided that it is probably better to abandon this neighbourhood, for the safety and wellbeing of my child. Advocates have openly encouraged the behaviour that has quickly laid waste to a vibrant neighbourhood that once had a place for people from every walk of life. Bizarre advocacy by our councillor using language such as “our neighbours who use drugs” has encouraged the surrender of the neighbourhood to the very worst of addiction, abuse, illness and the behaviour that accompanies these tragic circumstances.

Our “neighbours” who sell drugs, our “neighbours” who commit crimes of violence and our “neighbours” who ruin neighbourhoods are the fast friends of “our neighbours who use drugs.” The danger of focusing on those in the throes of addiction at the expense of everyone else who lives here is that it quickly creates a death spiral as everyone else looks to leave. I am not the first person to think of leaving, and I know I won’t be the last.

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Dominic Lamb, Ottawa

Is city hall really run by juveniles?

Re: Jim Watson opens up about life after leaving office, Feb. 17.

In Jim Watson’s recent interview, he bemoans the smaller number of journalists covering city hall council meetings. He says it is “sort of like there’s no adult supervision.”

Have we really elected a bunch of iPhone/media obsessed preteens to city hall? Maybe that is why they could not solve the parking problem disguised as a “freedom convoy,” or why they gave us an LRT as robust and reliable as a used Lada.

John Fraser, Ottawa

Name Russian Embassy street after Alexei Navalny

Russian President Vladimir Putin has achieved his objective: Alexei Navalny, his leading opponent, is dead.

Two years ago, when Russia invaded Ukraine,  there were unsuccessful attempts to change the name of Charlotte Street, which houses the Russian Embassy, to the name of Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Our mayor and council should now formally change the name to Navalny Street.

Every time the embassy receives a letter or package or its staff has to give directions to its location, they will be reminded of a fellow citizen bent on creating a free and democratic Russia. For Canadians, in Prime Minister Trudeau’s words, Alexei Navalny is an example to us all of “unparalleled courage.”

Robert Hage, Ottawa

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