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Flores, Dora From: Carol Newark < Sent: Tuesday, April 16, 2024 9:49 AM To: eComment Subject: Agenda Item 27 Attention: This email originated from outside of City of Santa Ana. Use caution when opening attachments or links. Honorable City Councilmembers, Given the vitriolic attacks we are receiving on social media, Harm Reduction Institute (HRI) staff are regrettably unable to attend in person this evening to speak on agenda item 27 due to safety concerns. HRI opposes the proposed resolution since it aims to deny HRI the ability to provide vital healthcare services to the most vulnerable residents of Santa Ana by establishing a syringe services program (SSP). To begin with, we would like to correct some of the assertions and accusations that the City has offered in support of its opposition to HRI and its mission. For example, the City claims that HRI's proposed SSP will lead to a large increase in the number of syringes littered in public areas. This claim is completely unsupported by evidence as all data presented by the City is from 2016-2018, two to four years before HRI ever opened. HRI offered syringe access for almost two years from 2020-2022 under the direction of a physician at a medical office, and went largely unnoticed by the broader community while serving the healthcare needs of hundreds of participants. Further, the City ignores the emphasis that HRI places on proper syringe handling and syringe collection. HRI strives to retrieve as many discarded syringes as feasible. As explained in the following paragraph from our application, which the City continues to leave out of the conversation, it is simply not possible for HRI to collect every single syringe it dispenses: HRI is dedicated to collecting as many used syringes as possible, however, because there are many other places to legally dispose of syringes, HRI cannot assume that it will be able to collect all of the syringes that it distributes. HRI participants may legally dispose of syringes at sharps disposal kiosks in the community and at other syringe services programs. Further, syringes are often confiscated and disposed of by the police. This number reflects these other avenues for syringe disposal. We hope our estimated 60% return rate is an underestimate, and plan to do everything in our power to collect as many syringes as possible from the community. HRI in no way intends to ONLY collect 120,000 needles annually. We hope that we will be able to collect more, and that people who utilize our program will use sharps disposal kiosks in the community that the CDPH has offered to provide. As described in our CDPH application, HRI is committed to using its best efforts to collect discarded syringes. The HRI outreach team will be in the community collecting syringes from participants Monday through Friday from 9 am until 5 pm so that they can be safely disposed of. In other words, HRI will be dedicating 40 hours each week to collecting syringes from participants. HRI will also do syringe litter sweeps throughout the city, and will operate a hotline where residents can report syringe litter. We take this issue very seriously, and are committed to increasing access to proper syringe disposal in the community (whether those syringes originated with HRI or elsewhere). Without providing any context, the City also claims that HRI is not transparent and has not worked collaboratively with the City. HRI was originally launched at a medical office under physician supervision in