Hollywood 4WRD presents a special community event: A Moderated Conversation with Three Leading Experts On the Intersection of the Addiction and Homelessness Crises
with Sam Quinones, Dr. Brian Hurley, and Nicole Farley, moderated by Windsor Square resident and longtime community leader Kerry Morrison on Tuesday, June 13th from 5:30 – 7pm at the W Hotel Hollywood.
“We are going to have a realistic discussion of what’s happening on the street,” Morrison told the Buzz. “I am not sure we will come up with any answers, be we really want to raise awareness as how serious this situation is.”
Morrison is one of the founding members of Hollywood 4WRD, a coalition driven to create systemic change to effectively address homelessness in Hollywood. The conversation she’s moderating will feature a keynote by journalist Sam Quinones sharing his unvarnished observations about the state of meth and fentanyl addiction in the US today, and how it is affecting our crisis of homelessness in Los Angeles. Then Morrison will moderate a conversation with Nicole Farley, Emergency Room Coordinator for JWCH-Wesley Health Centers – Kaiser Sunset, and Dr. Brian Hurley, LA County Department of Public Health, Medical Director, Substance Use Prevention and Control, and president of the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM).
Following the discussion, the panelists will open the floor for a Q&A with the audience, each of whom will have had the opportunity to submit a question with the purchase of their ticket.
“We’re thrilled to have assembled such a great group of panelists for an honest, public exchange about the devastation caused by substance use disorder, particularly on our unsheltered friends,” said Brittney Weissman, Executive Director of H4WRD. “Hollywood 4WRD is all about educating and activating our community. We hope this event will do a bit of both, and leave the audience inspired to do more to address the twin thorny issues of addiction and homelessness.”
The program will offer insights including:
● Simply moving unsheltered individuals off the streets is not effective treatment for those also struggling with addiction issues
● Treatment for meth and fentanyl addiction will largely not succeed in a community setting
● Part of the increase in homelessness in LA County over the last decade is due to a similar rise in meth and fentanyl addiction over that same period
● The hopeful innovations happening within jail settings where inmates, who are finally detoxed from their addiction to meth, are offered very intentional recovery programs
In addition to “educating and activating” the audience, In the Eye of a Tragic Storm is sure to inspire compassion as well. “We all have this capacity for addiction. We all can be that addict eating from the trash,” says Quinones. “The least of us lies within us all.”
The event will be held in the heart of Hollywood at the W Hotel Hollywood on Tuesday, June 13 from 5:00 to 7:30 p.m. It is generously sponsored by Kilroy Realty and Health Net,
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General admission tickets are $20 and FREE for H4WRD members.
To purchase tickets, please click here.
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To learn more about or become a member of Hollywood 4WRD, see Hollywood4WRD.org
