A planned sobering center in Portland, Oregon is mired in controversy. Its opening has been pushed back to fall 2026. Downtown business owners want it built faster, and police want a place where they can bring intoxicated people. But just how helpful would it be for people who use drugs, as local jurisdictions react to the March rollback of Oregon’s historic drug decriminalization law?
After state lawmakers repealed the provision of Measure 110 that decriminalized low-level drug possession, counties are permitted to adopt “deflection” policies, aimed at bringing people into treatment rather than jail, before re-criminalization takes effect on September 1.
In April, Multnomah County commissioners introduced a plan to build a sobering center in Portland, led by Commissioner Julia Brim-Edwards. According to local outlet KGW, the county was at that point searching for a location and awaiting a $25 million grant from the state.
Before Portland’s sobering center opens, county officials have a contingency plan: a 24-hour drop-off “treatment readiness center” for police to bring people using drugs.
What are sobering centers? Dr. Shannon Smith-Bernardin, cofounder and president of the National Sobering Collaborative, said in an interview that such facilities “provide a safe place for adult patients who are acutely intoxicated on alcohol or other substances to become sober while being monitored by trained professionals.” They’re intended for people who aren’t in need of emergency medical care, and designed around brief stays.
“The goal is for patients to sober up and move past the harms of acute intoxication, while also avoiding risk of additional injury, assault or physical harm from being outside in the elements,” Smith-Bernardin said. From there, patients—a large proportion of whom are unhoused—can be connected with substance use disorder treatment, health care or shelters. Smith-Bernardin said her organization works with over 70 sobering centers nationwide, which see over 121,000 people each year.
Before Portland’s sobering center opens, officials have a contingency plan. In June, Multnomah County Chair Jessica Vega Pederson announced the opening of a “treatment readiness center,” a 24-hour drop-off center for police to bring people using drugs. The planned facilities have raised objections from local businesses and even members of the county board, who claim they weren’t given adequate notice or a chance to voice their opinions.
No walkups would be allowed at the treatment readiness center, which is due to open on September 1 and would initially include 10 “sobering” beds. The sobering center, when it finally opens, is slated to have 35-50 beds available.
Advocates for the rights of people who use drugs have strong reasons for concern. While the facilities would act as alternatives to jail, the prospect of people being coerced, under threat of jail, into treatment they might not want has been central to opposition to Oregon’s re-criminalization of drug use.
“The facts are that involuntary treatments—better referred to as coercive—are less successful and cause more harms than voluntary treatment,” emergency physician and addiction specialist Dr. Ryan Marino, of University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center, previously told Filter. “There is even good evidence that such coercive measures for substance use increase the risk for things like overdoses and death [compared with] literally doing nothing at all.”
Portland had a sobering center before, called Central City Concern. It closed back in January 2020, after 30 years in operation. Police and firefighters were able to call a van to pick people up to go there, and the center saw an average of about 10 patients daily. Public officials indicated it was closing because conditions were worsening, and the center’s senior medical director suggested the center was unsuited to dealing with increasing methamphetamine use, leading to “unsafety and risk in the setting.”
“What law enforcement wants is a place to take people to put them out of sight. I think it’s a big task to create a space for folks on a wide range of substances. I would be hopeful they are preparing to work with people who are over-amping.”
Haven Wheelock is the drug users health services program supervisor at Outside In, a health care and harm reduction provider in Portland. She remembers the last sobering center, and its mixed reviews from people using drugs with whom she works.
One issue, she confirmed, was how the center was designed primarily to address the needs of people with alcohol use disorder, but eventually saw increasing numbers of people coming in for meth use, without being able to offer an appropriate setting.
“What’s helpful for one person is not necessarily so for the next,” Wheelock told Filter. “Some people found it beneficial, some found it annoying and some never used it. It depends on the individual and their needs. When we think about addiction we often want quick fixes—make it better, here’s a pill make it go away—but the causes of addiction are so complex.”
Still, she thinks it was better than taking people to jail or the hospital.
For the new sobering center to succeed, Wheelock said it must be prepared to serve people using all types of substances, especially stimulants.
“What law enforcement wants right now is a place to take people to put them out of sight when they’re using substances,” she said. “I think it’s a big task to create a space for folks on a wide range of substances. I would be hopeful they are preparing to work with people who are over-amping. I think stimulant use is much more visible when someone is really high, versus opioids. People have a lot more energy. I am hopeful they are planning to have a space that is accommodating for folks who are on stimulants.”
“Most of the people we work with know how to operate in a world where they can go to jail for substance use.”
The local battles over Portland’s facilities reflect the fallout from Oregon re-criminalizing drugs. Before those parts of Measure 110 were repealed, low-level drug possession was not subject to arrest or jail. Police officers could issue a fine, which would be waived if you called a hotline for a needs assessment. The process had its flaws and many people chose not to call the hotline, but the data showed drug arrests fell statewide, with no increase in Portland 911 calls. Yet lawmakers blamed decriminalization for high overdose rates—which have impacted the entire nation, and when decriminalization was never going to fix the drug supply.
Wheelock said that many of the people she works with have a sense of ambivalence about these changes.
“For a lot of our folks, they were not surprised that we’re recriminalizing drugs,” she said. “There’s a lot of mistrust in government. Most of our folks have operated under criminalization, it’s not like they started doing drugs because they were decriminalized.”
“Most of the people we work with know how to operate in a world where they can go to jail for substance use,” she continued. “Mostly, I hear not much will change because their behavior didn’t change when we decriminalized.”
“I think folks we work with, they feel targeted by police even under decrim; the police are not a trusted source of information,” she concluded. “The nervousness about law enforcement didn’t go away with decrim. People are feeling they are more likely to be targeted by police, but they always did. We’ve been seeing increased patrols and police presence which often happens in the summer, and more policing of homeless folks in general.”
Photo by Camilo Jimenez on Unsplash