http://www.vancouversun.com/health/Work+starts+sobering+centre+next+month/3543299/story.html
Summary
A $22-million sobering centre will be constructed in Surrey next month to assist and house people with drug and alcohol addictions. The City of Surrey believes that this facility will help to reduce the crime rate. Police will take intoxicated people to this new facility as long as they have not committed any other crimes. They will not be locked up and just let out in the morning. Instead, there will be people trying to help them. There will also be a mental health clinic operated by the Phoenix Drug and Alcohol Recovery and Education Society. A representative from Fraser Health said that this sobering centre will cost about $5-million per year and that the money will come from the existing mental health budget.
Connections
Opportunity cost is what relates this article to our text. The opportunity cost for building this facility is $22-million with an additional $5-million per year. This large sum of cash (opportunity cost) could have been used to 1) better educate people about drugs and alcohol 2) hire more police and RCMP officers 3) improve conditions at the hospitals. Money is our scarce resource here and we are making decisions on how to spend it. We are spending this scarce resource on a facility to help better the community.
Reflections
In my opinion, I think that the opportunity cost ($22-million) is wasted on this centre. Where would all this money come from? Obviously from us tax payers. I dont' think that everyone would be willing to pay more taxes for addicts. In the long run, I do not believe that this centre will help to reduce Surreys’ crime rate because addicts will no longer be going to jail. Instead, they would be sent to this centre where they receive help instead of punishment. They would not feel the necessity to change for the better because they are most likely put in there unwillingly. As I stated above, the money could have been used to educate people about the abuse of alcohol and drugs. Perhaps this sobering centre would prevail but it would be awhile before there is any display of success or failure.
I think your article could go both ways on whether or not building this "sobering centre" to be beneficial or non-beneficial.
ReplyDeleteBeneficial is because truthfully, this sobering centres would make a lot of drug/alcohol addicts realize a lot of things in life and possibly turn their heads and walk on their life in a straight road.
Non-beneficial because like you said, our taxes would be increased while we could have just used the money to better educate people beforehand and hire the people needed to catch/stop crimes.
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ReplyDeleteI find your article to be very interesting and provided me insight to debates in our locate communities that I was not aware of. However, I don't think that the center will be a waste of money. Because now instead of just throwing them in jail, we have people help change them/connect with them so that they can become sober. It will also help alleviate the work loads of police and emergency room staff. As they receive about 30,000 drug-and-alcohol-related incidents each year. Plus some of the feuds will come from the existing mental health budget. Therefore, I will have to disagree and support this center.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that we're paying money out of our own pockets for something that isn't even for certain in terms of whether it will work out or not is something i don't agree with either. I think it would be a lot easier if they used the money to get people to educate kids at school about drugs and alcohol.
ReplyDeleteI have to agree and disagree on this, as building this centre with $22 million is a big investment, but then again this would aid and help people for those who are drug and alcohol users. As long as they have not committed any other crimes, I truly believe that they deserve a second chance and they need help. Good point, however, on that we could use the money to educate others on drug uses, and that money in fact is scarce and we should manage it carefully. It would also be a burden to us in this economy, where jobs are scarce and wages are low, to pay more tax.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I believe that you make a valid argument on the effectiveness and cost of this facility, I also believe that, despite its cost, it has a potential chance of working. While I agree with you that people are not going to be too happy about paying tax dollars to help drug and alcohol addicts, I also firmly believe that a facility like this may very well be the turning point for many addict's lives. There may be very many addicts out there, who although know that their addictions are slowly killing them, cannot help themselves but with the help of professionals - may once and for all be able to cure themselves and return to regular life. But, on the contrary, there will always be those who do not and will not cooperate with the facility professionals to straighten their lives out - wasting our precious tax dollars. The facility's success rate will depend solely on the patient's willingness to be helped.
ReplyDelete-Peter Nguyen
your article was very interesting and easy to understand.i agree with what you're trying to prove. the government is wasting our 'scarce'(money) resource on this sobering centre. were paying unnecessary money on something that most likely won't work out.
ReplyDeletehowever i don't see how this facility will help to lower Surrey's crime rates. also i dont think most drug / alcohol addicts would be willing to go through this rehab house.
-shirlene hsiao