BAR HARBOR, Maine — Gov. Paul LePage and Maine Attorney General Janet Mills offered different approaches to Maine’s drug crisis in separate addresses before the Maine Medical Association, which gathered Saturday morning in Bar Harbor.
Speaking to about 90 people at the Bar Harbor Club, where the association was holding its annual meeting, LePage emphasized a “tough love” approach. He said he wanted to include more funding for drug enforcement agents and prosecutors in the state budget, but blamed the Legislature for redirecting the funding elsewhere.
He said he supports a multifaceted approach, including funding for treatment and prevention programs, but more resources need to be devoted to arresting and prosecuting drug offenders.
“Do we need treatment? Absolutely,” the governor said. “Do we need law enforcement? Yes, but $3 million isn’t cutting it.”
LePage said that much of the heroin coming into Maine is from out of state, and the traffickers deserve long prison terms. He referred specifically to Dionhaywood Blackwell of New Haven, Connecticut — “aka Smooth,” LePage said, referring to Blackwell’s alleged nickname — who was arrested Thursday in Bangor on charges of aggravated trafficking in heroin.
“Smooth is not an addict. Smooth doesn’t even touch the stuff,” LePage said. “He’s the one I want. I want him to enjoy Maine for the next 25 years.”
Mills, a Democrat who has sparred with the Republican governor on many issues, addressed the association about an hour after LePage.
Neither LePage nor Mills drew attention to their disagreements, but Mills employed a different tactic in addressing the roomful of doctors about Maine’s opioid epidemic. Instead of mentioning alleged drug dealers by name, she referred to four young Mainers who have died in the past year from drugs.
Molly Alice Parks, Ryan D. Bossie, Coleen Singer and David McCarthy all died from heroin overdoses, Mills said. Parks, Bossie and McCarthy were in their 20s. Singer was 32 years old.
“The deaths are the tip of the iceberg,” Mills said of the state’s drug problem, which also includes newborns affected by their mothers’ drug use, violent crime related to drug trafficking, and neglect by drugged parents of their children, some of whom have died as a result.
And it doesn’t just affect young people, she added. The ages of Mainers who have died recently from drug overdoses ranges from 18 to 88 years old, Mills said.
There should be significant criminal penalties for trafficking, the attorney general said, and Narcan — an emergency drug that can revive overdose victims — should be more widely available. She said doctors should be more upfront with their patients about the legal ramifications of mishandling prescription medications and better informed about whether their patients have been charged with drug-related crimes.
“I’m not here to point the finger at anyone,” Mills said. “I am asking for your help.”
