Over the past couple of weeks, staff at two of Toronto's supervised consumption sites have been getting some worrying visits.
Employees say private investigators have been "trolling around" the Parkdale Queen West Community Health Centre and the Kensington Market Overdose Prevention Society, asking locals and nearby businesses what they think of the sites, which provide supervision for drug consumption, reverse overdoses and supply harm reduction supplies like clean needles. Some staff feared the PIs were hired by the province.
They were right, according to Health Minister Sylvia Jones' office.
"We’ve already seen criminal and violent incidents around these sites — incidents that should never happen near a school or childcare centre. Now that the province is facing litigation aimed at keeping drug injection sites open next to where children learn and play, we have retained a third party to gather additional evidence about the impact of these sites," Jones' spokesperson, Ema Popovic, wrote in an emailed statement.
Ontario is facing a Charter challenge over its planned closure of 10 supervised consumption sites. The Neighbourhood Group, which runs the Kensington Market site and does not receive government funding, brought the lawsuit.
Previously, the Progressive Conservative Party's director of communications, Peter Turkington, denied that the government or the party had anything to do with the investigation, which he later said was a "mistake."
Popovic did not immediately respond to questions about how much the government is paying the private investigators or what the scope of their work entails.
The PIs work for Investigative Solutions Network, Inc. — "North America’s premier private security and investigative services firm," with offices across the country, according to its website. It was founded by a 28-year veteran of the Toronto Police Service and counts several former cops among its staff.
Staff at the consumption sites have been unclear on who the investigators work for. That the province was involved was only a rumour, until now.
It's been making people uncomfortable, said Rev. Maggie Helwig of the Church of St. Stephen-in-the-Fields, known as a safe haven and encampment for homeless people and those with addictions.
"It's very weird and disturbing to have private investigators going around in your community asking questions," she said.
"It really is causing a lot of — a lot of distress in the market. You know, it's a small, tight community, and having private investigators going around, asking questions is not something we're used to."
NDP MPP Chris Glover, however, said that while he was out for a walk recently near the Parkdale site, he was stopped by investigators who identified themselves as agents of the province. They took down his contact information, but he hasn't heard from them since, he said.
"The guy was pretty clear that it was the province that hired him," Glover said.
