Dakota Tipi Housing worker shares unique perspective in drug crisis

Marjorie Prince works in housing at Dakota Tipi First Nation, giving her a good perspective of problems in her community. In the recent war on drugs, she notes, the reserve grapples with people who are caught up in dealing, and make threats when you proceed to evict them. She explains their biggest threat at the moment is heroin.

There seems to be more and more of them. so you have more problems with housing. I don't know what's going on in their minds, but they're not the same," says Prince. "You can't talk to them. And what do you do with them? I got one girl. I can't do anything with her. She's homeless. She's really alcoholic, takes drugs, she's out of her mind, and families don't want her. She had nowhere to turn to, so we don't know what to do with her.  I don't know where she is today."

She says they place the woman in a temporary location, and she is kicked out by others.

"I was thinking about trying to get her into mental home or something, but even they don't even want her. They got to have certain issues, and she's really overboard," says Prince. "I'm glad we have security here, but even they're limited. They can only go so far, but we really need a strong alcohol and drug awareness program. Or else we need more workers."

Prince notes more AA workers are requires and not just a single person who happens to be related everybody in the reserve. Such situations, she adds, makes it hard for a worker to make decisions.

"We need to need to equip the security with more things that they need," Prince continues. "Things are just getting out of hand with the alcohol and drugs problem. We're all trying to get together and trying to help them. The one girl doesn't want to help herself, and not even her mother doesn't want to. So, she's at that level with drugs, and she gets abused. That's just the start. There's going to be more like that."

Prince says it's sad but she's glad a task force has been initiated and the community has more security. 

"I can't even let my grandsons go for a walk down the road because somebody will stop them and ask them if they want to buy drugs," says Prince. 

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