November 6-11


ECAD’s director Jörgen Svidén visited Portugal and the cities Villa Real Sant Antonio and Mafra. The purpose of the trip was mainly to participate as a key note speaker in a Conference organized by the city of Mafra; Prevencão Do Consumo De Drogas.

Thanks to ECAD’s close collaborator, Director of APLD, Dr. Manuel Pinto Coelho, it turned out to include a lot more than that. Besides important and fruitful discussions with Dr. Pinto Coelho, he had arranged so that the city of Villa Real Sant Antonio got introduced to ECAD.
This resulted in Villa Real Sant Antonio and Mafra becoming new members of ECAD at a ceremony in the city, all in front of media representatives and local politicians.


The very well organized Conference in Mafra was a success, not the least because it ended with great support for a restrictive and humane policy and that Mafra decided to become members of ECAD. ECAD and Mafra have cooperated for some years and there have been discussions about membership, so it is with great pleassure that the city now have decided to fully participate in our organization.

 ECAD is proud to welcome our first Iberian cities to the extensive network!

During the stay in Portugal it was also a meeting with representatives from Dianova and discussions about having an ECAD-conference in Portugal in 2011.

More information on that will come.

November 18-19

ECAD Swedish network of cities held its annual Conference in Stockholm.

There were several interesting lectures on some of Stockholm’s activities concerning illicit drugs: Housing first, preventive measures etc.
The participants met a newly appointed Deputy Mayor and ECAD’S new Advisory Board member Anna Köning Jerlmyr, who made a short presentation and heard about organisational activity plans for 2011 from ECAD’s director Jörgen Svidén.

ECAD Sweden has also decided that, besides Markus Häggström, Eva Andersson, Patrik Runesson and Marie Ljungberg-Schött should be re-elected to the Board. A new member, Dario Espiga, Deputy Mayor from Göteborg, was elected.
ECAD Sweden members have, among others issues taken up the task to develop the Swedish ECAD member cities` international contacts.
 
The Swedish ECAD network Annual Award was given to the IOGT youth activity JUNIS, in Umeå. The Board of ECAD Sweden is grateful for active iterest and engagement of this member cityin the preventive work!

ECAD Sweden will meet next year in Borås.

September 8-11

 
ECAD visit to Italy started with a seminar in Riccione, close to Rimini. Swedish ambassador to Vienna, Mr. Hans Lundborg, gave an impressing overview on work against drugs and drug misuse in European arena, with a focus on the work carried out in the United Nations (UNODC). This included some interesting discussion among the 50 participants.

The Seminar was followed by a visit to San Patrignano and their WeFree Day. This is San Patrignano’s  biggest annual event with high level international speakers, workshops and other activities.

 Among the speakers was Fabrizio Gandini, Minister for Justice in Italy, Honourable Franco Frattini and Viviane Reading, EU Commissioner. ECAD participated in the many events arranged in the Community and we were all impressed and satisfied.
ECAD’s seminar also included a round tour in San Patrignano, where the different working places were showed, as well as good opportunities to interrogate the management and people living in the Community with a number of questions.

San Patrignano is an impressive and very successful treatment facility with some 1 800 former addicts, living together for long term residence. Since 1978, San Patrignano has taken in over 18,000 people, offering them a home, healthcare, legal assistance, and the opportunity to study, learn a job, change their lives, and regain their status as full members of society. San Patrignano welcomes all young men and women who have serious drug abuse problems, regardless of ideology, social background, or religion, and completely free of charge, accepting no payment or funding from their families or the government.

ECAD plan to arrange a Conference close to San Patrignano even next year, 2011.

17th ECAD Mayors’ Conference:

European Cities Against Drugs met on Gozo (Malta) on September 23-25, 2010 for its 17th conference aimed to give support to each other and get inspired in the everyday anti-drugs fieldwork.

10 new Maltese Local Councils joined the ECAD network during the Conference: Birzebugga, Gharb, Gzira, Kalkara, Marsarskala, Qrendi, San Giljan, San Gwann, Ta’Xbiex, Xghajra. Welcome!

Besides the fully packed Conference work programme, the participants enjoyed also cultural and social events, visiting Dwejra with its Azure window and Citadel in the main Gozitan town of Victoria.

On the photo below you see the ECAD Award 2010 winner, representative of the city of Veliky Novgorod (Russia) Olga Vasiljeva.

Thank to all ECAD members, speakers and the Maltese hosts for a rich in content, well organized, fun and memorable meeting!

All speeches and other materials are published on our site, under “Conference Papers”.

Read Press Release ECAD AWARD 2010 Here

Jörgen Svidén, ECAD Director:

ECAD’s Mayors Conference 2010 finally took place in Malta, September 23-25. The Conference was first planned to be held in April but due to the well known ash cloud it had to be postponed.

Around 150 delegates from 66 cities, 17 countries, participated in the event on the beautiful island of Gozo, that took a false start on the 22^nd with a meeting both in the Advisory Board and in the core group of Youth in Europe. The first day of the Conference, with the theme “Empowering our citizens to healthier lifestyles”, started with welcoming speeches from Junior Minister for Consumer Dr. Chris Said, Shadow Minister Dr. Buontempo and ECAD’s Chairman Cllr Jim Corr. Thereafter the President of the INCB, Prof. Hamid Ghodse held an interesting and encouraging speech, amongst other issues on how it can be possible to achieve the goal of a drug-free Europe, with a focus on demand reduction and primary prevention as a key component of drug control, in particular at the local/city level. Dr. Evgeny Bryun, Director of Moscow Research and Practical Centre on Addictions, followed by giving some interesting examples of Moscow’s strategy and methods for demand reduction. The audience also got a lecture about the Maltese Police Drug Squad’s work and challenges from Assistance Police Commissioner Neil Harrison. After a refreshing lunch the day continued with Mr. David Turner, Chair of the Vienna NGO Committee on Drugs, who gave an enthusiastic and appreciated overview of the results from the 53^rd CND meeting in the UN. Prof. Charli Eriksson ended the first days Conference with a lecture on Evidence and Practice in Drug Prevention. After ECAD’s Plenary Session the Maltese hosts offered a much appreciated social program with a concert from a youth orchestra in Gozo, followed by a marvelous dinner hosted by the Office of the Prime Minister.

The Second day started with a lecture on the medical aspects of substance abuse from Dr. Anton Grech, an overview of Caritas Malta’s work by Ms. Roberta Fenech and a summary of the work of OASI, a treatment center in Gozo, by Director Manwel Cordina. Frans Koopmans, Director of Communications of De Hoop Foundation, then gave an inspired speech on an Integral Approach to Addiction. In the following Mayor’s Forum, the audience was addressed by Paula Kokkonen, Deputy Mayor of Helsinki, Anniken Hauglie, Commissioner from Oslo, Rumen Vidov, Mayor of Vidin, Sean O’Grady, Councilor of Killarney. The Mayor’s Forum is an appreciated standing part of the Conference, where leading persons from member cities give inspirational views of what is happening in their respective cities.

Mr. Rodrigo Paris, First Secretary of the Colombian Embassy to Great Britain, then showed a film and talked about Shared Responsibility, the environmental and social repercussions that global cocaine consumption brings to Colombia. There were many in the audience who believed this to be a new and most interesting aspect of drug abuse, which for sure will have impact in a number of cities around Europe in due time.

The next part of the Conference was the five parallel workshops: How to evaluate drug prevention by Prof. Charli Eriksson, Providing Hope: Experience & Practice of De Hoop Foundation by Frans Koopmans, New Russian Drug Policy Strategy Proposal: Advantages and Shortcomings by Prof. George Zazulin, Open Drug Scenes in Oslo—the Work of the Police & Co-operation with the Oslo Municipality by Deputy Chief of Police in Oslo Sveinung Spolheim and COPE: the Community Parent Education Programme—Parental and drug preventive education for young Roma parents by the Consultants at Staffanstorp Municipality Ulla-Britt Hedenby and Ingrid Bolmgren together with Project Leaders Micika Petrov & Goran Bogdanov.

The day concluded with a Signing ceremony of the ten new Maltese cities in ECAD. ECAD is proud and honored to welcome these Maltese cities in its organization and grateful to Pembroke City and Malta, for its marvelous work in order to recruit the cities. The more cities ECAD consist of, the stronger our organization will be!

The Conference ended with conclusions from Mr. Jim Corr, followed by a guided tour of the Gozo Island and a reception at the Gozitan Citadel, hosted by the Prime Minister.

ECAD thanks the Maltese hosts for their great hospitality and for making this Conference a success. We also thank all the speakers and participants for making the Conference so good. The Mayor’s Conference is an excellent opportunity to learn, meet colleagues and others from all over Europe, strengthen already existing contacts and to make new ones. It is also a perfect moment to tighten our organization and last but not least to have some fun. I do hope that you all had a good time during the Conference in all these aspects!

 
To the left: Bjørg Månum Andersson, Director General of the Department of Seniors and Social Services; Oslo's City Hall, the meeting venue.

ECAD Advisory Board held its regular meeting on June 18 in Oslo. The Board discussed routine issues on the agenda with focus on the budget.

Once again, the Board would like to bring attention to the fact that the ECAD economy fully depends on the membership fees paid by the member cities.  Membership fees are charged in accordance with the city’s population. This model was introduced in ECAD in 1998 and is still considered as the most appropriate and fair. All contributions, larger as well as smaller, paid by the member cities of different size are essential for running of an international organization of ECAD’s scale. Besides the membership fees, ECAD’s economy is formed by the generous support received from the City of Stockholm in terms of providing the organization with premises and other office needs.

The volcanic ashes that clouded the European air space prevented ECAD from holding its 17^th Mayors’ Conference in April in Malta. That is why the Board went through the preparations remaining ahead of this postponed conference which will take place on 23-25 September instead. The Board is satisfied with the fact that the conference programme holds in general and only minor adjustments are needed. See more information in the menu to the left under "Conferences".   

The Advisory Board was presented an up-date on Youth in Europe (YIE) programme by its manager Jon Sigfusson, Reykjavik. The programme is prolonged until 2012 with a possibility of further extension. In short, the YIE includes two parts: a survey aimed at defining risk and protective factors in regard to drug prevention in each participating city; and a mobilization of society in order to use the knowledge in designing of municipal drug preventive action plan. To remind you, the YIE is an ECAD initiative based upon a successful programme Drug Free Iceland which resulted in a great improvement of the drug situation among the Icelandic youths. Now, the idea of the YIE is not to compare cities with each other – there are many sources enabling such comparison – but to give each interested municipality a tool and a methodology which is proven efficient in reaching targets in drug prevention among the young people.

When ECAD Advisory Board holds its meetings in different member cities, an important part of the agenda includes presentation of the anti-drug work conducted by the hosts. It gives the Board members a better understanding of the needs of the members which are spread though out Europe.

In Oslo, the Board enjoyed a meeting with Anniken Hauglie, the municipal commissioner, who gave a much appreciated reflection on the drug situation in Norway in general. In addition, Assistant Director General of the Department of Seniors and Social Services Nina Backer-Roed told about a collaborative model of crime prevention among youths which is successfully being implemented in Oslo since 2006: the SaLTo-model. For more information in Egnlish please click here  http://www.salto.oslo.kommune.no/statistikk_og_analyse/

ECAD Advisory Board expresses its sincere gratitude to the host, Director General Bjørg  Månum Andersson and the City of Oslo for the great organization of the meeting and for their warm hospitality.