To Revive Portland, Officials Seek to Ban Public Drug Use
source link: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/11/us/portland-oregon-drug-laws.html
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To Revive Portland, Officials Seek to Ban Public Drug Use
State and local leaders are proposing to roll back part of the nation’s pioneering drug decriminalization law and step up police enforcement.
By Mike Baker
Reporting from Portland, Ore.
After years of rising overdoses and an exodus of business from central Portland, Gov. Tina Kotek of Oregon said on Monday that state and city officials are proposing to roll back a portion of the nation’s most wide-ranging drug decriminalization law in a bid to revive the troubled city.
Under the plan brokered by Gov. Kotek, a Democrat, state lawmakers would be asked to consider a ban on public drug use and police would be given greater resources to deter the distribution of drugs. Ms. Kotek said officials hoped to restore a sense of safety for both visitors and workers in the city’s beleaguered urban core, which has seen an exodus of key retail outlets, including REI, an institution in the Pacific Northwest.
“When it comes to open-air drug use, nobody wants to see that,” Ms. Kotek said in an interview. “We need different tools to send the message that that is not acceptable behavior.”
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Mike Baker is a national reporter for The Times, based in Seattle. More about Mike Baker
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