Leonard Preyra - MLA for Halifax Citadel – Sable Island

BY: Rick Howe

It was about a year ago we were embarrassed once again by the goings-on in downtown Halifax. A night of over-indulgence, fueled by dollar-a-shot drinks, led to a huge brawl, the arrests of 38 people, and the start of a debate that continues unresolved to this day.
The Dome lost its liquor license for a spell as a result of that night. The bars in the downtown, reacting to a groundswell of public anger over the on-going violence in the area, all agreed not to offer any more cheap drink nights. That was good enough for the provincial government. It backed away from calls to ban dollar drinks and promised to beef up inspections and help the city put more cops on the beat.
The bar business was booming again.
The lure of the university crowd’s return to classes, however, was too much for one bar and this fall, the Palace brought back the very popular dollar drink night specials. Business is good, very good, and it’s why the club has no intention of giving up the cash cow. How much is it worth? Don’t know, but the profits clearly outweigh the public backlash or it wouldn’t be an issue today.
Another group of doctors added their voices to that backlash this past week. In a letter to Halifax Citadel-Sable Island NDP MLA Leonard Preyra, the 10 doctors with Dalhousie University’s health services wrote they regularly see the effects of binge drinking. They point to physical injuries, sexual assaults, unplanned pregnancies, sexually transmitted diseases and alcohol poisoning. The doctors blame it on cheap drink specials they say are “specifically targeting the student-aged population.”
John Ross agrees. He’s the head of emergency medicine for the Capital Health district. The doctor put together statistics indicating one in seven early morning visits to the Queen Elizabeth II Hospital’s ER department were alcohol related in the first half of 2007, with an obvious increase on the nights some Halifax bars offered the buck-a-shot drinks.
A majority of those seeking medical help for liquor-related injuries were under the age of 25.
Ross says treating these booze-wounded souls is costing the taxpayers of Nova Scotia tens of thousands of dollars every night.
Adding more police to patrol the downtown and more on-site inspections only increases that cost.
The good doctor can’t understand why the province allows bars to push cheap booze on the young, who are more likely to over-indulge and take risks.
Liquor problems and Halifax have been linked since the very early days. In 1862’s Halifax, Its Sins and Sorrows, the authors lament about the number of licensed and unlicensed rums shops in the city, stating “we have one of them to about every 13 families,” while the number of bakeries was “one to about 65 families.”
It says liquor-related offences including charges of being drunk or drunk and disorderly accounted for three-quarters of the police arrests in 1859 and refers to those who sell liquor as “caterers from hell” and “legalized assassins” around whom it says government officials have “thrown the shield of their protection.”
Leonard Preyra, in a release, writes, the MacDonald government “has no reason to continue to ignore bar owners, municipal leaders, emergency room physicians, police and now family doctors who are all pointing out the serious damage caused by dollar drinks.
The Rodney MacDonald government has never given a single good reason why dollar drinks should be allowed to continue.”
Preyra is challenging MacDonald to offer an explanation.
We anxiously await his response.

rickhowe@halifaxnewsnet.ca