 Good afternoon everyone. I appreciate that you'll all settle in sit down. I distinguished honor to welcome you all to this event. It is truly only such an important topic that will bring us all together. Your attention and your respect are appreciated. At this time I would like to welcome Katie Van Haste from Senator Sanders office to share with us some information about this afternoon's event. Welcome Katie. Thanks so much Tracy. Hi everybody. I'm Katie Van Haste. I work in Senator Sanders office here in Burlington. Just a couple of quick housekeeping items for all of you. You may have seen gotten index cards when you came in. If you have questions for the senator or the panel that you don't want to ask aloud you can write your question on that index card pass it to the ends and folks on our staff will then collect those index cards and pass them up to me for questions. When we get to Q&A we're gonna have one mic in the middle and then two mics kind of roaming around with folks on our staff so if you have a question either line up or raise your hand especially if you're on the sides and we'll get to you. When the panel finishes speaking and we move into question and answer any member of the media at that point we will go off the record so cameras off pens down and we'll go off the record at that point so your question answers for the senator and for the panel will be completely off the record. I just want to thank some folks that we have here joining us in the room today community health centers of Burlington turning point of Chittenden County spectrum youth services and Lund they all have tables in the back and they've got a bunch of great information for you. Senator Sanders office also has a table in the back that has a bunch of information in it on how our office can help you as well as if you want to send a message to the senator have a problem we can help you with or a bunch of information on some upcoming youth services and events that our office is doing. So with that I want to introduce senator Sanders to speak to all of you. Well let me begin by thanking principal Tracy Rassico and her staff for all of their help in making this event possible today and it's nice to be back at BHS where a few years ago four of my kids graduated so. I also want to thank Tara Ruckert from the Burlington partnership for a healthy community and the above the influence BHS student group for your ideas as to what we should be doing today and let me also thank Attorney General T. J. Donovan Dr. Heather Stein and Kelly Brair for being here as well and you're going to hear from all of them in a few moments and mostly I want to thank each and every one of you for being here today. Now the reason that I am here and the reason that all of us are here is that I am worried. Your parents and your grandchildren are worried governor and the state legislature are worried and many of you are worried about an epidemic an epidemic that is sweeping our country and sweeping the state of Vermont and that of course is the very significant increase that we are seeing in opioid and heroin addiction and in fatal drug overdoses. Now I know that it is hard for kids your age to listen to an older generation believe it or not we were once your age and believe it or not when older people came before we were saying why do we have to sit here we got other things that we would like to do with our lives and you know what's this all about and we know that you as well as every other young generation in history has always done exactly the opposite of what your parents suggested that you do and we know that when your teacher tells you something as often as not you're going to think what do they know right nothing new about that and with that reality in mind you are sitting here now in an assembly and you have to listen to a United States senator you're gonna have to listen to the attorney general of the state you're gonna have to listen to a doctor and you're gonna have to listen to a former nurse and no doubt many of you are thinking why do I have to be here there are other things I'd rather be doing and so if some of you get bored and wish you were elsewhere I understand that but the reason that we are here today dealing with this very serious matter is that we need your help now in the United States Senate I sit on a committee it's called the help education labor and pension committee it is the committee that deals with all of health care issues and education issues and we hear from some of the smartest and most knowledgeable people in the United States of America and in fact from all over the world they come and they testify before our committee but on this issue opioid and heroin addiction the issue of why so many young people are turning to drugs and how we can prevent that it turns out that you probably know a lot more than the experts you might know more than anyone else what it is like to have and live in a family where your mother or your father is hooked on drugs and I expect that some of you here today are living that reality you might know more than experts from Harvard or Yale what kind of pressure exists when your best friends are experimenting with pills and they want to know why you are not cool why you are not doing what they are doing what's the matter with you if you're not experimenting with pills you might know how if perhaps you broke your leg skiing or you got some athletic injury or even if you had a molar a tooth extracted by your dentist how kind of nice that feeling was after you took those pain killers that was a nice feeling maybe I like more and how tempting it might be to continue taking them you might also know more than your teachers what it's like to be young in a very crazy world when you're dealing with anxiety or depression and you're watching the TV and you're seeing all kinds of weird things going on all over this world you know that experience better than any of us here and better than your parents so after this panel is finished it will be your turn to tell us what you think about the problem and how we can best solve it I need your help not only for Vermont but for the entire country you can also ask any questions that you want and the media will not be recording any of this so you can say what's on your mind there is no question that it's not a small question I don't care if anyone thinks it's a dumb question if it's something that you feel we want to hear your question and we want to hear your thoughts and here is the main point that I want to make regarding opioids and heroin you know everybody goes through life and every single day we all make mistakes I make mistakes you make mistakes sometimes we say something to somebody we insult them we hurt them we don't mean to do it sometimes maybe we're an athlete we screw up right here in this gym on the basketball court my son played on the basketball team you make a mistake the team loses you feel terrible sometimes you're hanging out with your friends you're on the phone too much you don't study for an exam you fail to your exam and you feel like a jerk maybe you're a senior you're not paying attention to what kind of college you might want to go to well what kind of job you may want to get if you're not going to college everybody makes mistakes but unlike those mistakes getting involved in heroin getting involved in opioids is a is a mistake and a path that in many instances cannot be corrected or at best is very very hard to correct and let me be very clear in many instances getting hooked on opioids and heroin will literally take over your life it will no longer be your life and it will prevent you from living in any sense of the word a normal life it will likely lead you and the attorney general will talk to this into criminal activity because you'll suddenly need money to feed your habit it will also in some cases lead to your death in Vermont last year a 112 thousand Vermonters died from drug overdoses alone three times as many as died in 2010 nationally last year we lost more than 60,000 Americans to drug overdoses that is more people in one year than died in the Vietnam War and what is especially tragic is that a significant percentage of the people who are getting addicted and dying are young people and let me also be very clear drug addiction is hitting people from every walk of life doesn't matter if you're rich or you're poor you're young or you're old male or female black or white famous or not famous it doesn't matter if you live in New York City or in rural Vermont no one is immune in a few minutes Kelly Brier will tell you her story about how hard she has had to fight to overcome addiction about how the father of her child died from an overdose about what drugs have done to her and her family and I hope you will listen closely to what Kelly has to say because Kelly's story is the story of thousands of people in our state and millions of people all over the country and let me also say that the Kelly and anyone else who is dealing or has dealt with addiction this is not an easy thing to talk about nobody wants to get up in front of other people and talk about some of the major serious problems that you have had to overcome in your life and too often people are ashamed or they are embarrassed or they are trying to hide addiction issues because they feel the stigma of their experience but Kelly hopes and she can tell you this herself that by talking about these issues it will be easier for us to finally address them and then I'm going to talk and then I'm going to ask you to pay close attention to Dr. Heather Stein who is a physician at the Community Health Center on Riverside Avenue and what Dr. Stein does every single day is deal with people who are addicted and what she is talking to talk to you about is the physiology of addiction what does it mean when you are addicted can you suddenly walk away and say you know what this is not good I'm not going to do drugs anymore well it ain't that easy because especially for young minds and young bodies heroin and opioids have a huge addictive capability they suck you in and it is very very hard to break that addiction she'll also describe to you how there are drugs out there on the street right now that are so powerful they will kill you almost instantly and lastly Attorney General TJ Donovan the highest ranking law enforcement official in our state will talk about the relationship between drugs and crime and how a very high percentage of people today in jail in Vermont and around this country are there because of some drug related issue and the Attorney General like all of us up here understands that addiction is a sickness and must be treated as a medical problem nonetheless many many lives have been destroyed and are being destroyed today and let me conclude by saying that I know that some of you sitting here today have personal experiences on this issue you might have a parents an aunt or an uncle a sister brother who has struggled with addiction some of you may even know someone who has died from an overdose and some of you may have used drugs yourself this is heavy stuff not easy and it might be hard to hear about it and it might be hard to talk about it but my hope is that the conversation today is helpful because if we do not have the courage to talk about this issue if you think we can just hide it we are never never going to solve it last point is that the state of Vermont has been more aggressive and I think more effective than most states and trying to address this crisis and today we have with us a number of agencies in the Chittenden County area who are all working on the problem and after our meeting ends please feel free to walk over to these tables that are out front and get as much information as you can also the state has a number that you can call 211 that directs call us to the help they may need so you can get some information today and with that let me now introduce to you Kelly Brier who is going to share some very heavy-duty experiences that she has had in her life with you Kelly Wow so right up in front of a mic here with a huge crowdful of people that that I'm really scared for when Senator Sanders office contacted the turning point to find someone to speak about their experience of course I jumped at the opportunity as he mentioned I was a nurse I was a professional in the community an LPN I worked in long-term care for 12 years when I was in high school I was very aware of my family dynamic in system I thought that I was above I was smart enough to know that if I experimented with drugs or with alcohol that I might be at risk because I saw other family members who are dealing with us and when I was a senior in high school I was a basketball player and I had an injury I had an ACL tear and reconstruction and that was my first experience taking opiates it was a very painful procedure I needed to be on pain medication for quite a while and I was able to rehab from that but after having experience with addiction issues now I know that was the turning point for me I liked them a lot they made me feel better it wasn't just for the pain of my injury and there was something in the back of my head that that told me these make you feel better these make you feel normal after high school I went to college went to VTC graduated from the nursing program and realized that I had chronic pain issues I have a condition called fibromyalgia which my body and my nerves tell me I'm in pain when there's no injury and over the years being smart and being a nurse I knew that if it got to that point where I the physical therapy wasn't working the chiropractic wasn't working that I would take some pain medication you know to get over that hump I always took it as directed I didn't abuse it but this was a pattern over a couple of years and after a series of tragedies and traumas in a very short period of time in my life my mother was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer I was pregnant with my first child I lost my mother three months after I had my son and the relationship that I had with my son's father crumbled and then I had an incident at work where I had a seizure and fell and fractured my skull had a traumatic brain injury and was in the hospital for a week more pain medication came and much stronger pain medication and going through all of these emotional traumas having opiates at this time I didn't even as smart as I was I didn't notice what the pain medication had started to mean to me I was starting to use the pain medication when I didn't have pain to get through the day I had an infant son and I was tired and I was recovering from this injury yet I was still taking I won't go into how much but a fantastic amount of pain medication which was called delotted which is a synthetic form of heroin it is an opiate that the healthcare system uses that was derived from heroin that is used as a very strong analgesic for such injuries as the one that I had having gone through some some counseling and realizing that this is the pattern that I had gone into I actually went to my doctor myself the first time and said look you know I think I'm taking this medication when I'm not having pain I'm taking it when I have other things going on and to get through the day and my doctor actually worked with me over a period of a month and a half to taper me off of this medication and I thought I was doing okay you know I ratted myself out I told my doctor I had a problem right this is this is going to resolve itself and you know again as educated as I was on this issue I didn't know what switching substances meant and a month later after having never really used alcohol at all even you know the occasional dinner with family or a glass of wine I was drinking from down to dusk and within a month I was blackout drinking every day with my infant son by myself I had started a new relationship about four months after my injury and this was my my daughter's father and he had a lifelong issue with alcohol and drugs and we were very honest and open about that and we both thought that we were doing okay I hid my drinking from him you know the relationship was toxic from the start and when I started having pain issues again after having gone to my doctor and told them that I had an issue with opiates I wasn't prescribed anymore when I did have legitimate pain so what I started doing was buying pills on the street when I needed them I was self-medicating I had returned to nursing at this point and I was working in local nursing homes and I started diverting medications from my patients I was working eight-hour shifts in a local nursing home and whatever I needed I was taking out of the medicine box and that was extremely easy and I've only recently begun to admit that because the honesty of that act I hope will grab someone's attention what happened in my family system I was hiding the fact that I was diverting medication we were still getting it off the street this of course triggered the addiction issues that my daughter's father had and we were just in this pattern of toxicity thinking we were normal we were a suburban family I was working he was working and we were both addicted to opiates when I ended up losing both of my jobs I became pregnant with my daughter and still was using opiates while I was pregnant with my daughter I was not honest with my OB I had gestational diabetes which will cause a fetus to grow very largely I only gained 13 pounds during this pregnancy despite having gestational diabetes luckily my daughter was born healthy but at that moment when she was born she was born with withdrawal symptoms and that was the first time that I actually admitted to someone when they confronted me with the fact that she had these symptoms I told the pediatrician yes I had been using however somehow I was able to do DCF when they were called saying it wasn't an all-the-time issue I was able to convince them that my household was safe that my daughter wasn't at risk I had visiting nurses coming into my house and was still able to convince these professionals that I was okay when clearly I was 110 pounds after having a baby girl and just a mess that's forward a few years later you know pills just absolutely took over our lives when I first started realizing hearing that voice in the back of my head saying you know your your life is a mess you're not paying your bills you don't have money to get food for your children you're about to lose your apartment you can't pay rent there was a little voice in the back of my head that said well maybe it's the pills no that that's not the problem we became homeless I had an aunt that took us in for a few months and I went back to drinking we couldn't afford the pills and immediately started binge drinking again with my children my daughter's father was working at the time and we were we were still trying to maintain I was absolutely depressed and we ended up living in a one bedroom apartment with a friend of his that I had just met with my two children my son and my daughter who I just turned one in the living room of this one bedroom apartment and the friend was an alcoholic less than a month later is when I first tried heroin I was absolutely at my bottom I was in so much emotional pain that it manifested more physically I just I could not get through the day and I cannot stress enough or be honest more than to tell you the first time that I used heroin that was it it took over my mind more than the pills more than the opiates I already had that obsession going on from my addiction telling my mind was telling me that's what I needed that was the fix that's what I wanted the minute I tried heroin that is all I could think about I was working a 12 hour shift job at that point I was able to maintain that for only a few months and that completely took over our lives he started using we started dealing to support our habit there was an incident of assault with the person that we were staying with against me and we became homeless and went into the hotel room system that Vermont has for families who are homeless with children and or cold weather situations you might have seen on the news or have seen within the community that Vermont supports and for four months we use that system to bring dealers into Vermont with our infant daughter my son's father had taken temporary custody of him thank God to keep him safe and that is what we did and that is the reality of what happened in our lives with addiction we had dealers in our hotel room with our baby daughter to support our habit I mean there there's no there there's no sugarcoating that at all you know it got to the point where that was our lives and it was okay and looking back on that just you know man so we ended up having members of his family take us in at that point when the state would no longer put us up and they are in long-term recovery his family unfortunately was riddled with this disease and had dealt with it and it came down to the point where we were in severe withdrawal one time and I convinced him to walk up the stairs with me hand-in-hand and they were the first people that I admitted that I had a problem too and that was the beginning of our recovery that was the summer of 2013 I went to act one detox for a week that's here in Burlington and went up to Maple Leaf farm for 25 days and after graduating Maple Leaf farm rehab I went to the Lund Center and was able to be safe with my daughter and then he started going to rehab and I was successful the first time I lived at Lund I was there twice in and out in five months you know ace the program I on the prize got an apartment and he was still in and out of rehab struggling he wasn't able to to stick to sobriety for more than a couple of months at a time and I really struggled you know trying to be a single mom and trying to reconnect with my son who I had lost contact with and it was just extremely difficult despite all of the support that I had I had the Lund Center I had a clinician I had a family educator and I had my little girl and I was a single mom for the first time and I didn't have my son and I ended up having a relapse about eight months later it was very brief thank God and with the support and the recovery and the 12-step programs I had been doing luckily I was strong enough to call them up and say hey I need to come back this this isn't going well I've relapsed I'm using again I need some help and they were able to get me back in within a month upon returning to the Lund home and really digging in that time realizing how addiction had changed my thinking the more work that I needed to do to get back to a healthy lifestyle the way that I was still despite all my work obsessing that that was the answer constantly I was able to really dig in and I use my clinicians help when my daughter's father was struggling just back and forth back and forth and I stopped making excuses for him and I think within a five month period of time he had returned to rehab three or four times and I was able to break away from that situation he wasn't healthy and to keep my my daughter myself safe because if I had any contact with him I know I would have started using again so a year or so later 11 months I graduated the Lund program again went back into the community was still working with my clinician and found out after an epic downward spiral of robbing convenient stores and you know pharmacies and this that and the other that he was found in South Burlington in the woods by himself of an accidental overdose and again that reality and saying that out loud just the impact that it has had not only on my recovery but my family and his family this is the mess when I met with Senator Sanders I said how messy do you want me to get because I can make it look real ugly that's the ugly my daughter doesn't have her father and I have to stay sober and I have to help her through that and I have to be strong enough to get us through that in a healthy way and it's because of the Lund home because of the sports that I have and because of the Turning Point Recovery Center that I've been able to do that I have been sober almost three years now and a year past my daughter's father's passing of an overdose I have no idea other than being able to ask for help and reaching out for sports that I have been able to do that because I tell you what my brain tells me regularly that that's the answer despite all of the work that I've done so we need to start telling the truth I hope that something that I've said today has made sense to some of your situations the things that you've seen maybe not in your family or in your own family but your friends family your peers what they're struggling with we need your help to find a solution I can only share what my solution has been we need to stop this now we I don't want any of you to have to feel the pain that my family has felt that his family has felt that my daughter and my son have felt I urge you if you have ever been asked to try and opiate for whatever reason even your doctor please be careful you have a choice now and I've had a choice for three years because of what I've done but after you have it in your system you might not have a choice ever again it's not much that one can say after hearing that story but now I want to bring you someone up here who deals with Kelly's issue every single day as a physician here in Berlin can please welcome dr. Heather Stein so my name is Heather Stein I'm a family doctor which means I get the chance to take care of people from birth to death and whole families I'm originally from West Virginia and then I moved up here to Vermont and a lot of what I do in my regular practice now is screening people for and a lot of treating people for addiction mostly to narcotics and opioids now I see many people in my clinic who've been touched by drug abuse and dependence I suspect a lot of you have as well I won't make you folks raise your hands but I suspect many of you know someone personally who's lost a job lost their kids for a period of time lost someone they love because of narcotics over 250 thousand kids a year use opioids for some reason other than pain and there are a lot of different drugs that can make you feel different but today we're talking about heroin morphine oxycodone Vicodin percocet fentanyl hydrocodone methadone dilated for some of those 250,000 kids it's their first time they're just trying it out probably with friends or even family for many others they're using it to feel normal because their bodies are dependent on the drug I wish there was a way that I could do a blood test or an online quiz to predict which of you are going to be the ones who are going to struggle with addiction right you might be the person who tries it once and says oh I hate the way that makes me feel I'm never going to do that again but you might not you might be the person who says that felt better I feel normal I feel good for the first time in a while and it would be great if we knew that beforehand because that second person the person who feels great or normal they're the person who's really at risk to having their lives be completely taken over by these drugs I do know that the earlier you first use any substance that can be addictive the more likely you are to become addicted to it and you can say that's not fair but I can say it's not fair that you know how to use your phone than I do right better than I do piece of new technology comes out and you're all over it and your parents and grandparents are looking at you like how did you do that you could probably learn a new language twice as fast as me right so it kind of makes sense that your brain is going to become hooked on something that's really powerful faster than somebody who's twice your age right I treated a young man who's about 19 years old and he'd been using for several years and during a relapse of heroin when he was still coming in to see me he said you know I feel like the truest version of myself when I've got heroin in my system but this is a small town so I could walk downtown and I could see this young man and I saw what he looked like when he was using and he didn't look like the best version of anything he was unshowered his eyes were read he didn't recognize me he was staring ahead with the glazed expression he looked like he had no place to go and no resources in the world even though I knew he was a wealthy college student from a good family and you guys know you know this from school you know this from your personal experience you know this from TV and the radio that the worst thing that can happen is not looking terrible when you run into somebody downtown right it starts with being a little bit distracted because you're super focused on this one thing your friends and family might notice that you're not paying attention to the things that you normally care about maybe your grades start to slip from the moment you wake up your first thought is of getting opioid so you feel right instead of reaching for your phone first thing in the morning you're reaching for a pill or powder you'll do things you can't imagine now to get narcotics leaving you feeling ashamed in your family terrified I suspect that if Kelly had been in this audience if you had told yourself what you would end up doing later in life you would have either laughed or gotten angry certainly not believe that it was possible if you aren't able to get what you need you'll start feeling physically sick right withdrawal just a little restless and irritable to start but soon the sweating and the runny nose will kick in muscle aches diarrhea people will start asking you if you're feeling well or if you have the flu and of course there are other risks right especially if you're snorting or using through a needle you can get infections in your heart the discs in your back your blood your skin blood plots hepatitis C HIV even if you manage to get through the withdrawal for a few days you'll realize it's not the same as before you started using because opioids cause changes in the brain that go beyond physical dependence they rob you of your ability to feel joy if you do not take something that hits that opioid receptor so that when that and a test that hockey goal getting somebody's phone number instead of feeling a rush you feel nothing opioids also take away the ability to deal with life what do you need with coping skills when you have a narcotic anger fear insecurity pain they all go away when you have an opioid in your system and your brain and your body forget how to manage those sensations you go from being the toughest person you know the person who can handle anything the person who could get a tattoo and not even a flinch to somebody who cries in a paper cut for getting a shot so I hope that most of you never know what I'm talking about today I hope that none of you ever come to see me for help for this because you can't stop using of course I'll help you if you do it's a rewarding work to get people their lives back but they are changed forever because of their history and I hope that you all don't carry those scars if you do and don't be afraid to either get help for yourself or help your friends and family as well I do see people who are able to turn it around like Kelly they often require a therapy medications lots of office visits and lots of time but there is hope and the sooner you get help the easier it is DJ Jonathan is the Attorney General of the state of Vermont the highest law enforcement official in the state mr. Attorney General thank you senator Sanders and thank you for your leadership on this issue the first thing I want everybody to know is this that I too am a seahorse the best days of my life were truly at this school absolutely and my best friends to this day are the guys I grew up with and the guys I went to school here and I saw mr. Mizzou's and earlier and that and made me think of that but listen to Kelly I want to thank you for your courage and talking about the truth I had a speech I'm not gonna give it because of what Kelly said if there was a confused kid in high school who didn't have a clue about what they wanted to do or what they want wanted to be life it was me I didn't have a clue and I can remember in this building having an enormous anxiety enormous anxiety about a lot of different stuff want to remember in particular was and he doesn't teach her anymore but he's a great teacher I'll say this there's a lot of teachers at this school and I'm rolling to public schools who made a big difference in my life mr. Mizzou's and being one of them so our teacher but was also a football coach freshman football coach yeah he used to say actually taught football and I think he did but mr. mr. mr. McGrath taught world history ninth grade and he used to have to read out loud in class and I couldn't read and I couldn't speak out loud and I couldn't articulate a lot of the words and I just remember that dread that anxiety of the fear of having to read out loud and so I compensated in different ways I wasn't a bad kid but I wasn't I wouldn't say I was the best kid loved playing basketball on this court I loved hanging out my buddies and I made a lot of dumb mistakes with my friends drink too much got arrested and I'll tell you what made the difference in my life who gave me a second chance and that's not even true either it's more like a third fourth fifth chance was the community was Burlington and I'm really lucky that I grew up in a time that we didn't have the challenges you guys have nothing like heroin nothing like opiates was even in the zone of possibility when I was growing up and I was no better than anybody else I just had a lot of different opportunities a lot of different second chances and that group of guys that I grew up with we went on and you guys are gonna find out as you go on through life a lot of you are gonna take a lot of different twist and turns in life and one guy in particular played football was the fullback in our team great kid good looking kid blonde hair blue eyes smart charismatic we lost touch but I'll tell you this the thing about growing up in Burlington you're always gonna be friends with the people you went to school with the people you grew up if you don't talk to them for years that's the way I was and then I see somebody talk to somebody who I grew up with we don't have to say anything we know it that there's a bond and this guy in particular we lost touch and then out of the blue I got this random message from on Facebook of all places and I don't really Facebook I don't even know if that's the term do you Facebook I don't know and it was a really random message and it was a desperate message he was having trouble and he asked me for help and I could tell from the message that it was a message of desperation and you know I did I didn't do anything I thought like a lawyer I didn't think like a regular person time went on I remember seeing his dad and kind of avoided the conversation then whether it was weeks or months later he did died heroin overdose no different than me and if you went back 25 years we were sitting in this gym together we'd sit and we'd be sitting side by side our group of guys would be sitting side by side and you couldn't man you could tell who was gonna do what in life you know in my previous job I was state's attorney here in Chittenden County and one of the greatest privileges of that job was to be in a position of authority in the community which you grew up in you dealt with a lot of folks who you grew up with you dealt with a lot of folks who you knew and I always knew that they were good people and I can think of another guy that I went to school with is a year a year ahead of me got into drugs and I mean I think Kelly said this well can't judge about how this stuff starts it starts then all of a sudden it just takes off on you and you don't recognize yourself and the point about this guy was I didn't recognize him this addiction which is a disease yes it kills people we know that for a fact but it kills people's souls and I remember seeing this kid I call my kid he's my age probably 40 more than a year older than me so it's probably 44 he was just a shell of himself and this feelings of shame these feelings of embarrassment that you're at ostracize that you don't feel part of the community this takes a tremendous toll on people takes a tremendous toll on this community and what we've done in the criminal justice system we've done a lot of good as in there's a senator Sanders has said in this issue on the fight on opiates we've done we've done well we need to do better but what we haven't always done well is deal with the issue of addiction in the criminal justice system I know a lot of people are good people went in jail and I think Kelly said this well you start doing these extraordinarily dangerous things out of desperation this is how powerful this addiction is you're robbing you're stealing you're breaking into people's homes and public safety is always going to come first but one of the challenges I think we have in this fight in reforming our criminal justice justice system is this that when you come out of the criminal justice system you come out with that criminal record this issue of being arrested it's gonna impact your ability to get a job you know where that scarlet letter on you get a job get an education get housing all the basic fundamentals that we all expect you and I'm sure you expect of yourselves to chase it's really really about the American dream what we're talking about and the loss of that American dream because of this disease so the other part I'm flashing back to was I can remember sitting in this gym listen to somebody trying to scare me and I'm not trying to scare you I'm trying to tell you the truth I think part of the answer going forward and we have a good job and I see my friend Mike Warren from the Burlington Police Department here and Jay Lawson and other members of BPD we've really changed the way we do business in law enforcement when it comes to the issue of addiction we've done a good job with enforcement we've done a good job with the intervention we've done a good job with treatment but what it comes down to is prevention my thinking has evolved in that and has changed and how do we create a community where we address these issues of trauma where we address these issues of mental illness where we address the issues of poverty where we give people a safe place where we wash away stigma for people who suffer from addiction where we wash away people stigma who frankly are in recovery and continue to do what you guys are all doing here today and then I learned at Burlington High School which is to take care of what I mean to each other to give each other a second chance and to lift people up when they're down and to speak out when we see somebody use that risk that made the difference in my life you guys face a lot more challenges than I ever did but I want you to know this we senator Sanders said we need your help and I look forward to working with you thank you