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Do you agree with the Kenora OPP, health and social service agencies that substance abuse is the number one problem in the city.
No	28	30%
Yes	65	70%
Total Votes: 93

Redneck ( March 10, 2010)
To me dysfunctional family structures are a huge problem. Have a look in the newspaper under the birth announcements and I bet more than seventy percent of the parents have different last names. Sure some may have kept their maiden name but to me there is no stronger family unit that a man and women who are married. Not single moms and live in boy friends.

Maxine ( March 10, 2010)
I don't think that substance abuse is the biggest problem. The biggest problem is what causes people to turn to substance abuse and that often comes from a breakdown in families. I'm not targeting single parent homes but any home where children don't receive the proper nurturing. So, in despair, they turn to alcohol or drugs. We also need to be careful when discussing this subject that we don't just point fingers at the street people who are so visible to us (& who often have had severe traumas in their lives). Was glad to see someone mention the drinking & smoking culture attached to sporting activities in Kenora. There are far, far more people in Kenora abusing drugs & alcohol than there are street people. We turn up our noses at a drunk lying on the street. Meanwhile our neighbour drives home drunk, beats his wife & children, passes out in his house and we think he's a fine fellow because we don't see what goes on behind closed doors. We need to find ways to support families in crisis and help them before they turn to substance abuse to numb their pain.

N/A ( March 10, 2010)
I do agree its a problem and allways has been in Kenora. Nobody has dealt with this right down to the law. The problem is that it has been going on for so many years that we and the law just accept it as the norm. We are known far and wide for the B.S that happens every day on the streets of our fair city. We talk about change but that is as far as it will go.

Bob ( March 9, 2010)
I've been in Kenora nearly 30 years. It was the first place I ever came to where people sat on a box of beer instead of the bench to play softball on a Tuesday night. Ice fishing? Boat fishing? Snow machining? "Have a drink" and have a smoke. Smoke and Fish Derby. Have a Joint and a drink. Everybody I worked with smoked. All the kids grew up around this. Make lotsa money: have some coke. I saw all the coke heads loose jobs, marriages and businesses. Then the coke dealers had to keep up with the times. Crack. Then Meth. Now Oxy's. And that's just in Town. Street people drinking hairspray are an eyesore for the tourists and the polititians, but that is not where the crime is. That is homelessness. The real substance abuse problem is the attitude that we care about other people who abuse substances, when in fact they are dependent and addicted, and we think by handing them a pamphlet or arresting them and making them go to a 28 day treatment program that they are going to go straight. They grew up being socialized to use drugs and booze. Now in 30 days all that will change, and the authorities can say they are solving social problems. The real social problems are poverty, poor education, and family disfunction. Substance abuse is a symptom of that, not the cause.

norman ( March 6, 2010)
it depends on what is called substance abuse,i don't believe marijuana should be classified as a street drug,but classified as a recreational drug if you look at the ones downtown look at their eyes,thats not marijuana thats crack lysol meth hairspray,need i say more??/

Progressive Redneck ( March 6, 2010)
It is sad, though this problem begins at home: it has become a 'norm' part of even our early elementary school system. Children routinely walk barely off of school grounds, during school hours to smoke cigarettes (sold for $1 during recess), joints ($5) and have alcohol in their 'pop' bottles. All this while students look on and our school administration feel their hands are tied. Parents give their children permission to leave the property, so there is nothing teachers can do. Kids routinely come into school under age with 'smoke breath' or 'glaze' eyes. This only escalates as they get to high school and beyond, onto the street. It is a positive thing to see the increased police presence at the highschools and on the street. Somehow, we need to take a stronger stance against illegal substance abuse.

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