Staying Alive

Staying Alive: Jeremy Kelly and the F-M Good Neighbor Project

By John Strand and Tom Bixby

There are big organizations that help drug users. A small one in Moorhead goes where the addicts are and really takes care of business. HPR spoke with Jeremy Kelly, founder of the F-M Good Neighbor Project.

High Plains Reader: What’s your mission and what do you do at the Project?

Jeremy Kelly: Social justice. We go by the harm reduction model of human service in the addiction field: low-barrier services that meet people where they’re at.

Addiction is not a disease. It’s caused by all the things coming together in your life. It’s the person’s reaction to it, with the tools they have for dealing with life.

From statistics we know that way more people have recovered on their own, with seemingly no intervention. The two biggest reasons for that are getting married or having a kid.

We help the people we serve find ways to reduce the harm involved with their use, doing things so they don’t overdose or catch diseases.

We distribute clean needles, take used needles off the street. We do naloxone training -- that reduces the effects of opiates in an overdose, and blocks the opiate receptors in your brain.

We supply other equipment as well, to keep people from using each other’s cookers, for example.

And we do street outreach. I’ll do a delivery at two, three in the morning sometimes. I’ll go out two or three nights a week, meeting up with people in the middle of the night, after I’m done with my day job.

HPR: How long have you been doing this?

JK: We started last January (2015). I got trained in it, my girlfriend Kerry got trained in it. We started it in her basement. She puts in a ton of work over there.

I saw a need. I was there myself years ago. I owed the community, especially that part of the community, so we just started doing it. About three months into it, I needed a safe place to keep all my stuff, so I rented the storefront, and so we could have a drop-in center too.

A lot of people drop in just to have somebody that appreciates them to talk to. We’re making contact with people out there who don’t talk to any other organization. These are paranoid people -- they’ve been hunted for years. We’re building trust.

HPR: How do you fit in with law enforcement?

JK: They’ve been supportive. Moorhead PD has said since the get-go that they’re

glad we’re around.

HPR: Are you surprised by the recent spike in heroin overdose deaths?

JK: The deaths happened all at once, so people are talking about it, but overdoses happen all the time. We’ve had 30 reported reversals from our naloxone that we put out on the street. Right around 30, since October. The deaths, I knew it was coming.

HPR: Heroin can be bought in the street, but isn’t fetanyl only available by prescription?

JK: It gets prescribed to people with chronic pain, but it gets sold in the street too. It comes in time-release patches. People just scrape it out of there and it’s ready to rock. They can break it up in water right away. It’s really easy to shoot up.

HPR: If somebody is attempting abstinence or in treatment, and they come back

to heroin, their body isn’t ready for a dose like that, with fetanyl?

JK:Right, when people are coming out of treatment or prison, that’s a huge amount of the

overdoses, that people think they can do the same amount that they did…

HPR:What would you say to family and friends of people who are addicted.

JK: The whole shame thing kills, the stigma behind drug use. It isolates people. They lose touch with society, family and friends. The more you can keep a person belonging and engaged, the better chance they have of overcoming their problems.

The more time I spend with a client, the more influence I have. They can find value in life again. I see it happen all the time.

HPR: How safe is it for people to turn to you, Jeremy, without being in danger

of arrest and loss of reputation?

JK: They don’t have to give their real names. They don’t have to come into the shop. They can call me and we can meet somewhere. We do it a few times a week. We understand that there’s so much heat on drug users that they’re scared.

HPR: Are you modeling this after other communities or efforts?

JK: I’ve been in several drug houses, bringing harm reduction equipment and having

conversations about needle use...I don’t think most of the bigger organizations are hitting

the street like that…we’ve got to be legitimate but we’ve got to get out there where they’re at.

HPR: Do you blame the medical profession for prescription drugs that lead to addiction?

JK: I hear a lot of that, but I don’t know if I can do that. Pain relievers help people recover and

pain management is important in medicine.

HPR: What’s your message to the community as a whole?

JK: Start treating these people with respect and allow them safe equipment -- a diabetic isn’t forced to use dirty needles all the time.

HPR: How adequate is your resource level to do what you do?

JK: I’ve funded almost all of it myself from the beginning. I’ve had a little bit of help here and there but probably 90% of it, I’ve funded every penny of it myself.

HPR: What kind of resources do you need to do it right?

JK: You know, I hate this part. I hate it because I owe this community so much that I wanted to do this on my own. And I’ve done it for a year now, paid the rent, paid everything. So I’m feeling better about it.

HPR: I’ve heard of a young gal waiting 30 days to get into treatment.

Yes. We can help them stay safe and alive. We do HIV and hepatitis rapid testing.

That’s a big thing right there. People after they’ve been shooting up for awhile just assume they have it, but if they know they don’t have it, it helps them act more safely; or knowing they do have it, then they can take care of it.

HPR: What’s your biggest frustration?

JK: People don’t have clean needle access on the Fargo side...legally there isn’t access.

If they’re caught with a needle on the Fargo side, they can get a felony. Clean needle exchange: the whole rest of the world is doing it, and it works. We’ve had hepatitis and AIDS epidemics,

and when syringe machines came in, the rate of infection dropped.

HPR: How can someone with an addicted friend get involved?

JK: A person can get involved in naloxone training, or if they need other services, they can get in touch with us anytime, and we can train them and set them up with equipment.

HPR: Is naloxone a nasal spray?

JK: There’s a nasal version of it, and an auto-injector version. It injects it into your muscle and

it talks to you. But they’re very spendy. We don’t have those, and we don’t have the nasal

ones currently.

The nasal ones are also very spendy. I went to CVS Pharmacy this morning. I knew they

have naxolone, and I wanted to see if there would be any trouble purchasing it. They were going to sell it to me -- they’ve got the nasal one and it’s $89. I thought oh my gosh, there’s no way any addict--

I’m sorry, I’ve got to quit using that word. I’ve learned so much since I started this, and the

more I learn...I don’t call people addicts anymore. It’s not a dirty word but it’s not a true

word.

HPR: Can naloxone be purchased through public health?

JK: No, but we have injectable naloxone.

HPR: What if there were a way to provide public donations?

JK: That would be great. What they should do is take all the money seized in drug busts and use it to buy harm reduction equipment, for overdose reversal. It saves lives and stops the spread of disease. It’s for the community.

Our naloxone is quite a bit cheaper than than $89 and works just as well. The law that was passed last year legalized the use of naloxone in North Dakota -- they had this big fight over

the needle portion of the kind that I have. Needles are still a felony in North Dakota if it’s going to be used with any kind of drug. So they had this big problem with it. They made it so you can

distribute the nasal kind, and so nothing has changed.

YOU SHOULD KNOW

Fargo-Moorhead Good Neighbor Project

1208 Center Avenue, Moorhead

Hepatitis and HIV rapid testing, March 31, 6 p.m.

Naloxone training, April 6, 6 p.m.

Support group: Family and Friends of Addicts, April 13, 7 p.m.