'This is not the end': LA advocates say veto doesn't shut door to safe injection sites
LOS ANGELES — In the sweltering heat, activist Soma Snakeoil gripped the microphone and led the crowd outside Los Angeles City Hall in a chant.
"They talk! We die!" the crowd shouted. "They talk! We die!"
It was International Overdose Awareness Day and dozens of people had gathered downtown to mourn and rage, lighting candles, laying down roses and planting purple flags in the City Hall lawn to remember the dead. At the microphone, harm reduction advocates demanded government action and investment in stopping overdose deaths as the annual toll has exceeded 10,000 statewide.
"As far as the governor," West Covina resident Debbie Fracasso said, growing emotional after stepping up to the microphone, "what part of this doesn't he see?"
The rally came the week after Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed a state bill that would have allowed supervised sites for people to inject drugs to be launched through pilot programs in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Oakland. The decision disappointed and enraged local activists who argue that such sites are desperately needed to save lives.
But it has
